Seddon and Wagner together until the end

Every time Bob Seddon and his assistant coach Bill Wagner, go on a road trip, the routine is the same. Wagner gets the bed closest to the window, Seddon the bed farther away. Wagner puts his shaving kit on the left, Seddon on the right. After working together for 32 years, there isn't anything the two don't know about each other.

This weekend will mark the last home games as head coach for Seddon, and it will also mark the end of a 32-year run for him and Wagner. Although there are no official numbers, the run they have put together as head coach and assistant coach at the same school in the same sport is definitely among the longest in Division I.

"We're from the same mold," the 70-year-old Seddon said. "We grew up in the same era. A lot of our philosophies are the same."

Seddon grew up in northern New Jersey and Wagner in South Jersey. In 1973, Seddon, who had become the new head baseball coach at Penn one season earlier, went on a recruiting trip to Woodrow Wilson High School in Cherry Hill, N.J. While he was there, he found more than just another pitcher. He found a man who would be his assistant and friend for the next three decades.

In the beginning, both served two positions at Penn. Seddon coached baseball and soccer, and Wagner was the baseball assistant as well as the head coach of sprint football, a position he still holds. But after this year, he too will step down from baseball.

"I'm disappointed it's coming to an end," Wagner said. "I'm going to miss baseball here at Penn. This weekend is going to be a very, very nostalgic thing for me, as it will be for Bob."

Wagner "knows baseball," Seddon said, and both have a reputation as a player's coach.

"There isn't a better pitching coach around that I know of," Seddon said. "And I hate to make him a pitching coach because he does a lot of other things."

Wagner is just as complimentary of his boss.

"Most people know Coach Seddon," he said. "He's very friendly, he's very easy on his players, he's been patient with the guys, he's been an outstanding fundraiser, he's done a great job."

The two have experienced changes in the school, their program, the players and the game.

"We've both grown with the changes," Wagner said. "We've had a lot of great memories, we've had a lot of fun memories, but I'm more concerned with the fact that I've had an impact on a lot of the kids I coached."

That relationship has blossomed into a successful coaching team. Although Wagner is listed as the pitching coach, as Seddon said, he is much more. He is always there, looking over Seddon's shoulder, making sure he doesn't make mistakes in the lineup and suggesting changes as he sees fit.

Although Seddon has final say, the two coaches work in harmony, which has enabled Wagner to remain an assistant for as long as he has and to improve the quality of baseball at Penn.

"He's given me a lot of full rein on a lot of the decision-making," Wagner said. "I've been blessed to have a coach who's given me that opportunity to coach that's kept me an assistant coach in baseball all these years."

And in an era when everybody is looking to get ahead, Wagner has been perfectly happy with his position, to the delight of Seddon.

"The most important thing about an assistant is his loyalty," Seddon said. "He never was looking for my job."

And as is typical when two people spend that much time together, their relationship goes far beyond that of two professionals who work together.

"We know each other's every move, each other's personalities. Everything comes natural," Seddon said. "How could you not?"

Whether it is entering a hotel room, picking starting pitchers or dealing with alumni, Seddon and Wagner have been the team running Penn baseball for the last three decades.

"We have a lot of stories," Seddon said. "Some which I can't tell you, when we were on a road trip, or out at night or something like that, some funny stories. It will be hard for me not to see him all the time."

There's an old saying that there's no crying in baseball, and two men who have been around the game for five decades probably won't shed a tear. But as the weekend ends, so does a great run for two coaches, two friends.

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