Mike Johnson was an iconic figure in Ashland sports. He played on state championship teams in Little League (1963) and high school football (1967) and was on Ashland’s state baseball runners-up in 1969. He was the first honoree in the Coaching Legends of the now defunct Ashland Junior/Senior League, named a Distinguished Tomcat in 2013 and a CP-1 Hall of Fame member in 2019.
Johnson was practically an institution in Ashland Babe Ruth, coaching the Reds for 19 seasons. Former players sought him out long after their playing days were over. They often came back and thanked him for inspiring them.
What better testimony can there be for a coach?
Johnson told me once the when the players would come back to see him that he would do a double-take because the boys who were 13 to 15 years old when he coached them were now grown men. But if they told him their name, he remembered them and could recall details they may not even recall.
And they sure loved him and the impact he had on their lives.
Johnson has a passion for Ashland youth baseball that carried on for more than 50 years, starting back in his Little League days in the early 1960s. It was a turbulent time for African-Americans and it was during Johnson’s days as a Little League All-Star that he his eyes were first opened to prejudice.
Johnson was a member of the Ashland American 1963 Little League team that would eventually become state champions and came within one victory of making it to the Little League World Series. They played the State Tournament in Lexington and the Ashland team stayed at a motel that would not allow the team’s two Black players – Charlie Jackson and Johnson – to get in the swimming pool.
“On the last day before we left, I dove into that pool with all my clothes on,” Johnson said with a grin in an interview with me.
After the team won its first game in the State Tournament, he remembered the coaches wanted to treat the players to something special. They tossed around ideas like bowling and swimming before settling on a game of miniature golf because there was a course just down from where they were staying.
“I’d never played miniature golf in my life,” Johnson said. “I was looking forward to it. Everybody was excited.”
The team went together to the course and grabbed a club. But the owner stopped Jackson and Johnson from picking one up, telling the coaches that those two boys wouldn’t be allowed to play.
The team decided if their two friends weren’t welcome, they weren’t staying. It was a unanimous decision.
“Growing up in the ‘60s for a black kid was kind of rough,” Johnson said. “Sports was kind of a relief.”
While Johnson learned about prejudice during that trip to Lexington, he also learned about friendship and respect.
“It meant a lot to us that our teammates and coaches stood behind us,” he said. “They wouldn’t do anything or go anywhere that we couldn’t go.”
He said it also may have inspired the Ashland American All-Stars, who went on to win the State Tournament.
“I think it made us play harder, I really do,” Johnson said.
Johnson later played on a Babe Ruth state champion and was a starting cornerback on Ashland’s 1967 state championship football team and was the quarterback on coach Herb Conley’s first Tomcat team in 1968.
His oldest son, Mike Jr., was an all-around athlete and one of the greatest running backs in Tomcat history. He’s now a (track) state champion coach too at Mercer County and an outstanding assistant football coach. A younger son, Charlie, was a member of Ashland’s 1990 state championship team making them the only father-son duos to win state football titles in Tomcat history. His daughter Angie was a tremendous high school and college basketball player and college coach at Georgia and Florida State. He and Anyetta, his wife of 54 years, had reason to be proud.
His speeches to All-Star teams always underscored Ashland’s tradition and how much fun it is to ride the fire truck after winning a state championship. He was a man who knew through life experiences in this Tomcat town that riding the fire truck meant you were something special.
Johnson coached many All-Star teams during his 19 years and, while he never won a state championship, the players left with good memories. Players always liked playing for Johnson because he was fair and he made the game fun. He expected the players to give him their best effort every time and they knew it. I had the honor of coaching with him during my son’s three years on Babe Ruth All-Star teams. I learned so much about coaching and even more about him. He was an inspiration.
His coaching skills were not limited to baseball. He was a constant with the Ashland Junior Football League as well. If you can coach, coach. This man could coach.
And If not for some health issues that were eventually too much to overcome, he might have never stopped coaching.
But Mike Johnson left an imprint on Ashland sports that has few equals. He will always be a Tomcat Legend.
MARK MY WORDS 2 