Joe Martinez was our coach, our mentor, but most importantly our friend. This is a photo gallery dedicated to his memory. Please leave a message about how Joe has touched your life in the comment box below.
Comments:
“Without Joe, I would not have accomplished my goal of qualifying to NCS. He pushed me to work my hardest every year. He was a great coach and will be missed by everyone. ” -Kristina Bergstrom
“Even if he’s not here, Joe will always be our swim and water polo coach throughout highschool. He will be our motivation to do our best and reach beyond his expectations he had for us. I will miss him dearly.” -Kathleen Nguyen
“Thank you Joe for a really fun 2010 season. You always knew how to make us laugh and cheer us up if we were down. Thank you for believing in me when I doubted myself. R.I.P. We all love you.” -Austine Lee
“It is incredible how many hearts he touched throughout his years of coaching water polo and swim. Everyone loved Joe, from his wonderful sense of humor to his encouragement on how to be better both in and out of the water. I had the best and most enjoyable time swimming during the two high school seasons I swam for him. He will be forever etched in my memories of both of swimming and high school as an amazing friend and coach. Even in his absence, his legacy lives on – he has influenced all of us in great ways and we will always be grateful.” -Beatrice (Tuna) Sun
“To me and many others Joe was not only a swim coach or a water polo coach, he was like ‘one of the girls.’ Joe had patience, a great sense of humor, and a big heart. No one could have handled coaching dozens of girls as well as Joe. He knew when he needed to be tough on us, but mostly he was all bark and no bite. Joe was an inspiration to everyone who knew him, he still is. His death was a complete surprise but the fact of the matter is, Joe was an amazing person who had a huge impact on many lives. In one of the last team speeches he gave he asked that all the younger swimmers continue to swim throughout high school, and to not quit on ourselves and our team. Well, there is no way no we will let him down now.” -Blair Ackerland
“When it hurts this much to know that someone is in a better place, you can only guess that they touched your lives in a way no one else can.” – Sarah Lucarelli
“Joe wasn’t just our coach &mentor. He was family. We’re all a family on the swim team, and he was the big Mexican dad. He helped push us to be the best we could be, and even when we were down he would always be there with a smile on his face and his arms outstretched to give us a hug. He was a just a great guy overall and is one of the people in this world that deserved to die the least. And I don’t think I’ll ever get used to not seeing him sitting at the pool deck.” -Arushi Atluri
“Joseph Martinez was a man who made us get into the pool before the sun had even risen, who made us swim extra for every minute late we got in. He was a man who taught us discipline and how to work hard, who pushed all of us to be the best we could be. But he was more than just some coach who told us what to drills to do and what sets to swim. He was a man who had the remarkable ability to turn any player’s crappy day into one that was worth living, because he showed us the value of our team. He showed us that worth of having such a close knit group of players, teammates we could share and appreciate each day with. Joseph Martinez was a man who saw through all of our lame excuses and pushed us to be better than we thought possible.
Joe, you used to always say that “pain is weakness leaving the body”. If thats true, then I think that everybody you ever knew is about to lose all of the weakness that ever resided in any deep crevasse of their body, because the pain that we all feel without you here is far greater than any amount of pull-outs or sprints that you could ever have made us do. I can’t put into words the sadness that I feel when I think of all the ways in which you changed my life. You saw something in all of your players that we couldn’t see in ourselves, and you pulled that talent out of us, practice after practice, season after season. You made me test my own limits and taught me to never complain or say no when someone tells me to try harder, even if I don’t think it physically possible. Papa Bear, you taught me to the value of hard work, and you blessed me with good times that I will never forget. You made me into who I am today, and because of that you will never be gone. You will live on in all of us and will forever remain in the hearts and in the minds of all those who’s lives you’ve touched.” -Hannah Scobel, Class of ’10
“Joe made swim season the best time of the year. He never failed to put smiles on our faces, and I could always count on him to wipe away the worries of the day. He was an amazing coach, everyone’s friend, and just an amazing person in general. I’ll never forget the times we spent together as a team and the encouragements that he gave me. Thank you so much for making my high school swim experience one of a kind. We’ll all love you always and forever.” – Maki Tohmon
Photos
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