Coaching comes next for star local baseball player

SILER CITY — While having an outstanding baseball career at Southwestern Randolph High School, Randolph County Post 45,  Pfeiffer University and with the Asheboro ZooKeepers, Bryce Marsh said he always felt he would one day get into the coaching aspect of the game.

When the opportunity arrived, he didn’t hesitate.

In just three short years, Marsh, a 2018 graduate of SWR and a 2022 graduate of Pfeiffer, has stepped into the world of head coaching as he is spending the 2025 summer season as the head coach for the Chatham County Post 305 American Legion team.

He spent just one year as the team’s assistant in 2024 after coaching a Pony League team in Chatham County in 2023.

“I figured eventually, yes, but I didn’t know when,” Marsh said of becoming a head baseball coach. “Things fell into place. I was teaching kids what I had learned and everyone seemed to like it and I got better options. People saw that what I was teaching the kids made sense.”

While just embarking on his head coaching career, he already has a moment that will last a lifetime. Although he came to McCrary Park last year as an assistant, he took his American Legion team to McCrary Park for the first time as a head coach on June 16. When he went to the coaches meeting at the beginning of the game, his former head coach Ronnie Pugh was waiting for him.

“It’s funny, having played in this Legion program for seven years and seeing him in the umpire meeting,” said Marsh, who will return to McCrary Park on July 3 after hosting Post 45 on June 26 at Jordan-Matthews High School. “I’m not going to say it wasn’t intimidating. They have one of the best histories in North Carolina. He’s always going to have great players.”

The meeting and the game that June day was interesting for at least one other person.

“It was interesting seeing Bryce the other night and it was a lot of fun, too,” Pugh said of the game Post 45 won 9-6. “We saw some things we used to do and I’m sure he picked up several things from Pfeiffer. Bryce will do a good job. I wish he was up here with us.”

Pugh said it’s far more than just the baseball knowledge Marsh possesses that will serve him well in his coaching career.

“Bryce was always such a solid person,” Pugh said. “It goes beyond baseball. He handled his kids, he handled his team in a way I would have expected out of Bryce. He will do a great job if he stays with it. Bryce is the type of coach you want your kids to play for.”

Marsh has been a star player everywhere he’s been. He graduated at Southwestern Randolph High School in 2018. Although stats were not published his freshman season, he hit .306, .378 and .392 his final three seasons. He recorded 65 RBIs, 21 doubles, three triples and seven home runs.

The Cougars were 65-39 in his four years on the varsity team — he played just one jayvee game before being brought up to the varsity level his freshman season — including 31-14 in league play. 

Marsh went to the American Legion World Series with Post 45 in 2017 and 2018.

In his four years at Pfeiffer, he hit .320 in 103 games, 94 of which he started. He recorded 113 hits, scored 86 times, had 21 doubles and 21 home runs. He knocked in 102 runs and had a slugging percentage of .558.

Marsh said he has many fond memories of his years at Pfeiffer, where he played under Jordan Stampler and assistant coach Josh Harris.

“Josh Harris was so good at keeping everyone consistent and Jordan Stampler was very close to his players,” Marsh said. “He loved watching players get better. I remember me and Kirby Lambert (North Moore graduate and former Post 45 player) hitting in the cage at 10, 11 o’clock at night. It was great.”

Marsh played the 2022 summer season with the Asheboro ZooKeepers, hitting a Coastal Plain League-high 13 home runs. He knocked in 35 runs that season.

After graduating from Pfeiffer, he started working as a personal trainer at Gold’s Gym in Greensboro, but he left there and started working at his families’ Auto Parts store in Siler City.

He was married in 2023 and recently had his first child, a daughter. 

Marsh began coaching Pony League baseball in Chatham County in 2023 where Harris — who recruited Marsh to Pfeiffer and is now a member of the Chatham County Chamber of Commerce — told Chatham County American Legion coach Will Felder he should definitely look at Marsh as an assistant. So Marsh went from Pony League to the assistant coach of the Chatham County American Legion team in 2024. When Felder decided not to return as head coach, another door opened for Marsh.

What Marsh is teaching, he said, is a mixture of everything he had been taught by a number of coaches he had throughout his playing career. 

From middle school, to Junior Legion, to Senior Legion, to Pfeiffer, to the ZooKeepers, Marsh said he picked up pieces of coaching information along the way.

“It’s been kind of a mixture of everyone really,” Marsh said. “It definitely started in middle school where Coach kept us motivated to Tyler Clapp who would tell you the absolute truth to Ronnie, who looks at the game at a completely different level than everyone. Then Jordan Stampler at Pfeiffer was real personal with everyone. Even (my Junior Legion coaches) who were really strict with me. It’s a mixture of everybody.”

Chatham County is 2-9 this season, including a 10-8 loss in eight innings to Liberty Post 81 last Saturday night.  

“I would definitely say I would love to be a head coach as long as possible,” Marsh said. “The way life is now and having a kid, I don’t know what path I will be on. I would love to be a head coach as long as possible.”

The game of baseball will be better off as long as he does.