Roger Kincaid, Georgia State softball head coach, started at Georgia state as an assistant before taking over as the head coach ten games into the 2011 season. That season, Coach Kincaid lead the Georgia State to a CAA championship. Since then, he has won over 200 games, including 30 or more in each of his first six seasons. Coach Kincaid had an interesting life before Georgia State; he played college football at the University of Georgia, where he also won a National Championship.
You played football at the University of Georgia and won a National Championship, so how did you get involved with softball?
Kincaid: My daugher was playing softball and I was just a dad sitting in the stands and realized the guys that were coaching didn’t really know what they were doing. So I told my daughter, I said, “You know what? I think I’m going to start coaching.” That’s how I got my start, strictly by accident, strictly because I had a daughter, but it’s been a blessing for me and my family.
Since you’ve taken over here at Georgia State, you’ve had several 30 win seasons. What do you think are some of the reasons behind that?
Kincaid: Well, I’ve been fortunate to surround myself with some good coaches who share the same philosophies that I do, who share the same work ethic that I do, and have the same belief system that I do, as far as what we want to get accomplished. We try to create a family atmosphere and make sure that everybody feels like they belong. At the end of the day, I tell my coaches that I insist we care more about people than we do players, and I think they feel that. I think that’s one of the things that makes us different than a lot of the teams that we play against, because I think our kids know that we do care about them and we want them to be successful not just in softball, but academically and after they leave here.
You went from a high school coach to college assistant and then a college head coach. What was that adjustment like?
Kincaid: It was different because I had always been working a full time job plus doing the high school coach plus doing the travel ball coach, so I was never able to spend the entire day on my passion, which was coaching. As a high school coach and a travel ball coach, you are judged by your results, but your way of making a living isn’t based on wins and losses. The other thing that you have to know as a college coach is that you have to produce and you have to make sure that your kids are doing the right thing and you have to win.
Who is the best athlete that you’ve been around?
Kincaid: I played with Herschel Walker at the University of Georgia, absolutely phenomenal. I’ve never seen, heard or witnessed anybody that was in his class. The thing that was amazing to me is as good of an athlete that he was, he was probably an even better person and you don’t usually get that combination. As far as a softball player is concerned, the obvious answer is Ivie Drake. She’s the only All-American that we’ve ever had. She was an All-American her freshman year and I would compare her the same way that I said about Herschel. She’s a great athlete, but she’s probably a better person than she ever will be an athlete.
What’s it like to be able to coach at home?
Kincaid: Amazing! I was a high school coach, travel coach college coach and never had to move. It’s a pretty unbelievable story. I’ve been blessed beyond belief. My family gets to see the games. I was born in Georgia, raised in Georgia, went to college in Georgia. I have no desire to go anywhere but be here and it’s awesome.
Tell me something about yourself that a lot of people don’t know?
Kincaid: I would say probably a lot of people don’t know that I did play college football. I also played baseball. I played baseball right after I got out of college up until my knees wouldn’t allow me to do that. I wanted to play baseball in college and my coaches were going to allow me to do it but every spring, it didn’t work out. The other thing people don’t know about me is that in my immediate family, I probably have 135 people. And all of them live in Metro Atlanta except for two.
