Jimmy Link

Jimmy Link coached college basketball for 18 years and had his first head coaching job at 30.

Nick Carlson made the introduction. Link walked into the McBastard Studios for the SALTYmf GOAT Podcast having never met Brad, who took one look at him and said he could be his own brother Jimmy. Brad also told him he looks more like a linebacker than the guard he was, which Link did not argue with. He works in business now, at the company where his brother is VP of sales, and he does not sit still any better than the host does.

He got where he got by recruiting. He volunteered a year at Flagler after graduating and parked cars at a Hilton when he was not at practice. A season at Washington College in Maryland, two more at Flagler, then a Division I assistant job at North Florida. Paine College called because their coach had noticed that the Newberry players who beat them had been recruited late in August, and wanted to know whether Link had done it. He said he could recruit anything. At Paine he took Division I transfers and second and third chance guys, put them on scholarship, graduated most of them and won 82 games in four years. At Clayton State he won the Peach Belt twice. When campus police told him his leading scorer had found a key to the new arena and was letting himself in at three in the morning, he told the player he was stepping out to the bathroom and that the key he knew nothing about should be on his desk when he got back. It was.

His boss at Newberry left for Hofstra after one season and Link had no job and a wedding coming. He got the Paine job before he reached the end of the aisle and told his wife they were moving to Augusta once they were through it. Four months later the head coach was gone and Link had the job at 30, with Maverick on the way, assuming they would not keep a white guy at an HBCU. Paine was in accreditation trouble and had just cut football after one season. His team won 17 straight and finished 25th in the country, and the conference sent only its tournament winner, so they stayed home. The road took the rest. It is, he says, why he is not married any more.

He got out in 2020 and has not missed it. He goes to games now and sits behind the bench with good seats and nothing to do. He will not coach Maverick, because they are the same person and it would not go well, and he wants his son handled by 15 different personalities before he gets to high school. He taught him the shot put instead. Maverick finished number one in Georgia for sixth grade, the first time he ever threw it.