The Stroh Report...where you hear it first!

Happy Thanksgiving!! Turkey Ice Cream Cake.......

2010-11-23T13:00:00.000-08:00

Hayden's 12th Birthday

2010-11-23T12:55:00.000-08:00

Bellas 11th Birthday at "Material Girl"

2010-11-23T12:51:00.000-08:00

Hunter and Lori Take Washington, DC Part II!!

2010-11-03T10:14:00.000-07:00

Summer RV Trip to Grand Canyon!

2010-11-03T10:07:00.000-07:00

Spring Break in the Happiest Place on Earth!

2010-11-03T09:59:00.000-07:00

Stalnely Cup Finals Game Two, Fifth Row From Ice!!

2010-11-03T09:55:00.000-07:00

Bella Meets US Congressmen Rep. Manzullo on Behalf of JDRF

2010-11-03T09:52:00.000-07:00

Bella Does Multiple Flip Flops!!

2010-11-03T09:16:00.000-07:00

Bella Sings "Love Story" in the school talent show! Brave!!

2010-11-03T09:02:00.000-07:00

JU Hall of Fame Weekend

2010-11-03T08:40:00.000-07:00

Florida Today Article on my Dad!

2010-07-04T10:46:00.001-07:00

July 4, 2010

Of all Wasdin's titles, coach is his favorite

"Another iced tea, coach?" the young waiter asks.

Tom Wasdin looks up, smiles, nods.

He hasn't coached a college or high school team since 1973, and yet calling him "coach" rests comfortably on his ears like a favorite pair of sunglasses.

He's done a lot since 1973 -- been a developer, made millions of dollars, been a mover and shaker and difference maker in political arenas, and kept a hand in sports to help it flourish. In fact, at the end of this month, Wasdin begins a two-year term as chairman of the Florida Sports Foundation, which assists in bringing amateur and pro sporting events, like Super Bowls and BCS Championship Games, to Florida.

But coach?

No.

And yet, almost four decades later, the word resonates like a special chord, in tune with Wasdin's core feelings and philosophies.

Even his wife, Susie, refers to him as "my husband and coach."

How does he feel, after all these years and all these millions of dollars made and all these other accomplishments achieved, about still being called a coach?

He takes off a pair of oversized drugstore sunglasses that protect his eyes from the aftereffects of cataract surgery. He is 74, a man with more yesterdays than tomorrows. He leans forward. His thoughts are clear, and he searches for words to match that clarity.

"It's like being called judge or colonel," he finally says. "I think it's one of the nicest things people can call you. One of the most respected things a person can be called."

Wasdin heard the word "coach" a lot recently, when he was inducted into the Jacksonville University Athletics Hall of Fame. JU was the last place Wasdin coached, back in 1973, when he led the Dolphins' basketball team. Many of his former players returned for the induction ceremony, and it got Wasdin reflecting on that chapter of his life.

"I owe the success I've had largely to athletics," he says. "The lessons I learned from sports I've used my whole life. Teamwork, loyalty, hard work, self-improvement, sacrificing self for the good of a cause, leadership."

He pauses, thinks about all those things and forages for further explanation, if not meaning.

"People who've never played sports, you just can't explain it to them."

Humble beginnings

Wasdin grew up in rural North Florida, not in the small town of Waldo, but outside of it, on a farm without indoor plumbing or electricity. His mother died two months after his birth and his aunt and uncle, who lived down the road, raised him and his sister. He still worked on his father's chicken and produce farm, rising early before school and returning home after school for chores.

He was a very good small-town athlete, once setting a state record when he scored 52 points in a basketball game. In six-man football, he once threw 26 touchdown passes in a season and had a 78 percent completion rate, both of which became national records.

"Sports was my life," he said.

He hoped, too, that it would become his way out. But to say he charted a specific course would give him too much credit as a teenager. Wasdin remembers working one summer, as he did six days a week every summer, toiling beneath a humid, humorless sun, loading watermelons onto a truck, and thinking there had to be something better.

"I wish I could say I had a plan," he said. "My plan was to stay off the farm."

But even as he was pitching watermelons onto a truck, sweat stinging his eyes during another 12-hour workday, thinking about what he would do with his life, Wasdin also thought about the importance of his present job. Not so much the job itself, but how he approached it.

"I was the best watermelon loader you ever saw," he said. "My philosophy was, do the best you can at your present job and someone will come get you. Do that and you'll never have to apply for a job."

He went to the University of Florida, tried out for the freshman basketball team and promptly sprained his ankle, ending his playing career. Still, in 1958 he earned a bachelor of science degree in physical education, becoming his family's first college graduate. By now, he envisioned a career path as an educator, working up to a principal.

Recognizing talent

He went to work in Jacksonville's Duval County as a physical education resource teacher. It was there that he recognized a talent for recognizing talent, a resource that served him well both as a coach and later as a businessman. Traveling from school to school, teaching elementary students, he came across a couple of boys in whom he saw potential. One was Steve Pajcic and the other was Ronnie Sellers.

After meeting Pajcic, Wasdin told a faculty member that someday the kid would be Florida's governor. As for Sellers, Wasdin cajoled him into playing football.

In 1986, Pajcic, by then a Princeton alumnus who played basketball with Bill Bradley and later graduated from Harvard Law School, was the Democratic nominee for governor. Today, he runs a law firm in Jacksonville.

As for Sellers, he became an All-American wide receiver for Florida State and later an NFL player for the Patriots, Cowboys and Dolphins. Today, he runs his own insurance company in South Florida.

And guess what Sellers still calls Wasdin today?

Coach.

"We were very fortunate to have Coach Wasdin as our coach," Sellers said. "He had a major impact on my life, both in and out of sports. I played for two of the greatest coaches in sports, Tom Landry and Don Shula, and there wasn't much difference in what they did and what their approach was, and how Coach Wasdin did things. Very similar."

Wasdin took kids like Sellers and the Pajcic boys -- Steve and his brother Greg, who later was an FSU quarterback and then an attorney before tragically dying four years ago, at 58, from a deer tick bite -- and molded a Jacksonville sports dynasty, first at Paxon Jr. High, then at Paxon Sr. High.

Though he coached many sports, Wasdin's passion was basketball. In 1963 and 1964, his Paxon High teams went undefeated in the Gateway Conference and twice won the Duval County championship.

Lifelong friendship

It was during those formative coaching years when Wasdin met another basketball coach by the name Joe Williams, who was coaching at Terry Parker Jr. High. Williams was an excitable young man, running up and down the sidelines, yelling instructions. At one point, the first time the two men coached against each other, Williams didn't realize he was standing in front of Wasdin and his team's bench.

"Uh, coach," Wasdin told a suddenly sheepish Williams, "don't you think you ought to be down there with your own players?"

That night, Williams inadvertently left his coat at the gym, and the next day he returned to retrieve it. He saw Wasdin, and they struck up a conversation that led to a lifelong friendship.

Wasdin left Jacksonville and Paxon High School in 1964, the year before the Pajcic boys, Ronnie Sellers and other young athletes he had groomed for years, won the state basketball championship.

He left because he'd gotten an offer from Eddie Feely, an up-and-coming Brevard County coach who later led Merritt Island High to an undefeated football season and state championship in 1973. Feely was the athletic director at a new school, Cocoa Beach High, and he hired Wasdin to be the school's first-ever basketball coach as well as its golf coach, assistant football coach and head of the physical education department.

It was there that Wasdin met another man who would become a lifelong friend.

Wasdin was working hall duty one day when he noticed a guy in dark-rimmed glasses.

"May I help you?" he asked.

"My name is Rick Stottler," the man replied, "and I'm looking for Coach Wasdin."

The two became friends, softball-playing buddies, and later business partners, developing condominiums, subdivisions, sports complexes, government facilities, restaurants, yacht clubs and marinas. They've also put on surfing festivals and county fairs, and co-owned the Cocoa Beach Pier and Cocoa Expo.

In fact, it was Stottler who pulled Wasdin back to Brevard in 1973, seven years after Joe Williams hired him at Jacksonville University to be his assistant basketball coach and head recruiter. The year was 1966, and Williams wanted Wasdin so badly at JU that he offered Wasdin even more pay than what he was making as the Dolphins' head coach.

"I felt Tom was the most capable person I knew," said Williams, who last week retired from BCC as the school's Major Gifts Officer for the College Foundation. "I liked him. I liked his personality. I knew how energetic he was and how hard he worked, and I needed someone I could trust and who worked as hard as I did."

Wasdin immediately went to work doing what he did so well, recognizing talent and then recruiting it to JU. He brought in Artis Gilmore and Rex Morgan, both of whom went on to NBA careers. Using his Brevard connections, he signed a 6-foot-11 kid from Jim Oler's BCC Titans team named Pembrook Burrows.

"He was persistent. He came to a lot of my games at BCC," recalled Burrows, now a retired FHP lieutenant living in South Florida. "Once I got to Jacksonville, Coach Wasdin was a man of his word. He didn't recruit you and then forget about you, or what he promised. Forty years later and he's never been more than a phone call away. He's someone whom, if you call him a friend, he's a true friend. I probably wouldn't be what I am today if not for him. I owe him a lot."

Gilmore was the team's center, Burrows the power forward and Morgan the floor general at guard. JU rounded out its starting five with guard Rod McIntyre and forward Vaughn Wedeking.

In 1970, Williams and Wasdin almost pulled off a miracle. That was the year the Dolphins became the smallest school by enrollment to ever make the Final Four and then the championship game, where their David lineup went against the Goliath that was legendary coach John Wooden's UCLA Bruins.

The Dolphins lost that game, and then they lost their coach, Joe Williams, to Furman.

After Williams left, Wasdin became JU's head coach, compiling a 68-16 record over the next three years, a winning record at the time topped only by Wooden, Jerry Tarkanian and Al McGuire, all of whom became Hall of Famers.

New direction

Physically, though, coaching took its toll on Wasdin.

"So much pressure in coaching is self-induced," he said, "and I was feeling it. Just a tremendous amount of pressure and stress. I was burned out. I couldn't sleep, I had anxiety, nervousness, the shakes. My doctor told me, 'Don't worry about old age, because if you don't change your profession and get a new lifestyle, you won't have to worry about it.' "

His old friend Stottler always wanted him to come back to Brevard and go into business together, so Wasdin did. Through the years, as he made millions, he never looked back. Even still, Wasdin also never looked away from sports, either.

He's always stayed actively involved with BCC sports, practically single-handedly saving the school from eliminating athletics when that became a very real possibility this past decade. For 12 years, he was on BCC's Foundation Board of Directors, serving as president in 1992. The Wasdin Family endowed the college's first Faculty Chair for Athletes with a $40,000 contribution.

Once, to help raise money for Titan sports, Wasdin played in the BCC Marathon Golf Tournament, completing 224 holes in one day to set a state record.

He served on the Florida Sports Foundation, appointed by Gov. Jeb Bush. He served on Brevard County's Tourist Development Council, helping to bring spring training baseball here. He's a past president of the Florida Amateur Athletic Union and served on the National AAU, as well.

Through it all, through the many hats that he's worn as a businessman, philanthropist and a mover and shaker in politics and athletics, there's one hat that still fits him the best.

The one that bears the word "coach."

Additional Facts

Thanksgiving 2009

2009-12-24T07:20:00.000-08:00

2009-12-24T07:16:00.000-08:00

Where are they now: Tom Wasdin

Photos

BASKETBALL

Tom Wasdin

Athletic accomplishments: In three seasons as Jacksonville University head basketball coach (1970-73), Wasdin guided the Dolphins to two NCAA tournaments and an NIT berth. He was Joe Williams' assistant coach the previous four years, including the Dolphins' run to the 1970 Final Four. Wasdin's overall record of 63-18 represents the highest winning percentage (.778) of any basketball coach in JU history. His 1970-71 team, which lost to Western Kentucky in the NCAA first round, finished with a No. 11 ranking, the last time the Dolphins were ranked at the end of a season. A native of Waldo, he was head basketball coach at Paxon and Cocoa Beach High before joining JU as an assistant.

What he's doing now: President and CEO of Wasdin Associates, a real estate commercial and residential company in Cocoa. Since leaving JU in 1973, Wasdin has been involved in several business ventures, including owning Kennedy Point Yacht Club in Titusville. He also implemented a sports facility called Cocoa Expo after purchasing the former Houston Astros and Florida Marlins spring training site. Wasdin, 74, and his wife, Susie, have three children (Steve, Lori, and Drew) and nine grandchildren.

On why he got out of coaching at age 37 despite his success: "The real reason was because it was such a competitive environment, it was ruining my health. It was taking more a toll out of my life than I was getting out of it. Some people can leave work and not take it home with them. Basketball at JU was very important in those days. If you made a mistake, everybody knew about it. You could never let your guard down. There was always one more phone call, one more ticket to sell. I was too competitive. I didn't have the personality or mind-set to relax."

2009-05-18T10:30:00.000-07:00

Hunter's Big Adventure in Washington DC

2009-03-27T09:03:00.001-07:00

Hunter Turns 13!

2009-02-16T18:19:00.000-08:00

Good Bye for Now, Grandpa!

2009-02-06T11:45:00.000-08:00

Randy's Dad, Dean Stroh, passed away on Feb. 4th
after his way too short battle with pancreatic cancer.

Our hearts are heavy but are memories are full.

We will miss you more than we can express! You were the best father, grandfather, husband and friend anyone could hope to have...

Saturday football games will not be the same without you in the side-lines but we know you will be there somehow.

We were blessed beyond measure to have you in our lives!

Some things we learned the hard way...

2009-02-06T11:36:00.000-08:00

Diabetes Rule#522 If you start thinking that you really good at managing diabetes there will ALWAYS be something that will bring you back to reality and show you that you know NOTHING.

Diabetes Rule #523 If you give the school nurse the last of your mini-juices there will ALWAYS be a life threatening emergency before you are able to buy more at the store. Bella adds that this unfortunate event will happen in a place situated to cause the maximum amount of embarrassment to her.

Diabetes Rule #524 If your daughter eats a sandwich before gymnastics do not give her any insulin or else her blood sugar will drop to the 20's.

Diabetes Rule #525 If your blood sugar is in the 20's and you have not passed out, God will give you just the amount of steps needed to make it to your mom before collapsing in her arms.

Diabetes Rule #526 If you are not coherent and don't understand how to eat glucose tablets (and the mom is panicking) then you will probably be sitting by angels: one will be a paramedic, one might happen to have a container of apple juice that continues your life and the last one will run to her car to get change for the drink machine and then tell you, after it's over, that you are amazing.

Congratulations Hunter

2009-01-19T05:03:00.000-08:00

Hunter won his school wide "Geography Bee"! We are still kind of in shock! First he makes the honor roll and now this?? Now he will take a test to qualify to go to the state finals!

We are especially excited because this could be the year that we can write a Christmas Newsletter! Never before have we had anything noteworthy to report. Now, it's only January and we already have some material for the makings of a fine newsletter come December!

Lori is going back to school in the spring with a goal of becoming a RN which will eventually lead to becoming a "Certified Diabetes Educator" in about 20 years...haha...taking the math placement tests could derail this dream. However, Hunter is tutoring her!

After traveling to the SEC Bowl where they watched Florida win yet again (Go Gators!) Grandpa and Grandma are now in Washington DC for the inauguration of President Elect Barrack Obama. Somehow they managed to score seats to the swearing-in...

Yes, this could be a very fine year for a Christmas 2009 newsletter

Thanksgiving in Paradise....

2008-12-02T17:25:00.000-08:00

Florida or FSU??

Football is a Messy Business

2008-10-31T05:59:00.000-07:00

Football is a Messy Business!

Delaney Turns 6!

A Rose is a Rose!

Welcome to New York!!

2008-09-12T13:59:00.001-07:00

Lake Geneva

2008-09-03T11:10:00.001-07:00

2008-09-03T10:56:00.000-07:00

Hayden's First Falcons Game!!

Hunter's Excellent Adventure

2008-09-03T09:42:00.001-07:00

Hayden's Headlines

2008-09-03T09:22:00.001-07:00

Bella's Snapshots in Time

2008-09-03T09:16:00.001-07:00

Wide World of Delaney

2008-09-03T09:07:00.001-07:00

High Adventure

2008-09-02T19:58:00.001-07:00

In Memory of Joshua Spencer
February 20, 1990 - March 7, 2008

First Day of School

2008-08-27T09:36:00.000-07:00

Go Falcons!!

2008-08-23T09:15:00.001-07:00

July 4th in Georgia

2008-07-09T17:56:00.001-07:00

The Stroh's had a blast celebrating the 4th of July
with our cousins! God Bless America and
God Bless Uncle Steve, who put on a most
awesome fireworks display with, of course,
the accompanying music!

It turns out that Steve has
finally gotten his happily ever after, after all,
when he married the perfect girl, and as an added bonus,
Lori got herself the ideal sister!

Welcome to the family Heidi, Nathaniel, Preston and Gracie!

Story on Lori's Dad, Tom Wasdin

2008-02-13T06:35:00.002-08:00

FLORIDA TODAY February 5, 2008

Taming a painful 'beast': Trigeminal Neuralgia

After 30 years of facial ailment, patient finds relief, but still searches for cure...

After 30 years, Tom Wasdin, a widely known retired local businessman and philanthropist, still refers to the painful facial affliction he has quelled -- at least for now -- as the"beast." Frequently misdiagnosed and poorly understood, the condition's medical name is trigeminal neuralgia, which causes so much nerve pain that doctors sometimes call it "suicide pain," as some people end up taking their own lives.

But Wasdin's message is one of hope, not despair. "Don't give up," he said. "There is life after this. I knew, somewhere along the line, I could be helped and others can be, too." He and his wife, Susie, a co-owner and vice president of Wasdin Associates in Cocoa Beach, recently went public with their struggle against the chronic disorder, not only to draw attention to it, but also to their mission of helping to find a cure.

The couple has pledged $600,000 to the University of Florida's College of Medicine to help jump-start a cutting-edge research program, which will be housed initially in the McKnight Brain Institute, according to university officials. The money will go toward the establishment of a permanent Endowment fund, whose interest will be used to attract and pay top scientists and eventually to set up a separate research center.

Like so many aspects of trigeminal neuralgia, researchers acknowledge that little is known about how many people suffer from the disorder, which is classified as an "orphan disease," or one affecting fewer than 200,000 Americans. As such -- and also because no one dies directly from the disease -- it is difficult to obtain funding, or research attention, said Roger Levy, chairman of the patient-founded Trigeminal Neuralgia Association in Gainesville. "Statistically, it doesn't show up very often," said Levy, who also has the condition. "But we believe there is an epidemic, and that it is far more pervasive than is thought."

Anecdotally, Levy said, it takes some seven years between the onset of facial pain and a proper diagnosis, as the pain often is mistaken for a tooth or jaw problem. In Wasdin's case, it took five years for a diagnosis. "It began as a mild hindrance," he said, describing an early tingling sensation on one side of his face that began in 1975. "Over time, it turned into a devastating experience." At its worse, the pain felt like an "electric shock" shooting across his cheek, the 72-year-old former developer and college basketball coach said. "Or, like sticking a red-hot ice pick into the brain." A touch, a smile or even a gentle breeze could trigger that pain, Wasdin said, which researchers think is likely caused, in most cases, by a blood vessel impinging on the fifth cranial nerve. One of 12 pairs of nerves in the face, the trigeminal nerve is the largest, taking its name from its three branches that conduct sensations across the eyes, nose, forehead and upper and lower jaw. "The condition has exacerbations and remissions, where there is nothing for a year, and then it strikes again," said Dr. Albert Rhoton, professor and chairman-emeritus of neurosurgery at the University of Florida's College of Medicine. "The episodes tend to worsen over the years,"

Although there is no cure, Rhoton said, some patients can find pain relief through microvascular decompression, an operation in which a surgeon pushes aside the vessel, if one is found, and places a piece of material between the nerve and blood vessel to interrupt the pulsating between them. "It is the most effective procedure we have that doesn't destroy the nerve," Rhoton stressed. "Afterwards, some 70 to 75 percent of patients can go 10 years without pain, and some even get pain relief for life." Melbourne neurosurgeon Dr. Jonathan Paine of Holmes Regional Medical Center agreed. "It is the gold standard for surgery," he said, "and the most definitive approach that goes directly to the heart of the problem." Because the operation takes place so near to the brain stem, however, he said, patients generally stay at least two days postoperatively in the hospital, making it a major surgery. Wasdin underwent the decompression procedure after taking Tegretol, an anti-convulsant drug often used to block nerve firing in other diseases, such as epilepsy, to fight his pain.

Although the drug worked well for a while, he eventually needed higher doses, which caused side effects, such as nausea and dizziness, and a "terrible quality of life," he said. So, Rhoton performed the operation in 1980, giving him about 10 months without pain before "the beast returned," as he was driving over the causeway to Cocoa Beach, watching a beautiful sunrise. "When it came back, it was one of the most discouraging days of my life," he recalled. Still, through his deep faith and the constant support of his wife, Wasdin said, he kept seeking ways to dull the pain, turning to a number of other approaches, including acupuncture and radio-frequency treatment to injure or burn the culprit nerve fibers. The radio-frequency treatments worked for a number of years, before the pain came back first on one side of his face and then the other -- considered a rare phenomenon.

Discouraged and uncertain what to do next, Wasdin ran into neurosurgeon Dr. Jeffrey Brown of Great Neck, N.Y., at a 2006 meeting on trigeminal neuralgia in Orlando. Brown, who serves on the medical advisory board for the disorder's association, suggested he try balloon compression. "I didn't know anything about it," Wasdin said. "But he told me 'less is best,' " describing the minimally invasive outpatient procedure Brown later performed, using a balloon-tipped catheter to squeeze part of the trigeminal nerve against the hard edge of the brain covering and the skull to bring relief.

It can be repeated, as needed. And so far, it seems to be working: Wasdin feels so well, he said, that he now serves on the board of the Trigeminal Neuralgia Association. "I've been blessed today," he said. "I have no pain, and I'm not on medications." Added his wife, Susie, "He probably will not benefit directly from the research (at the University of Florida), so why did we want to do this?" "The pain is so debilitating, if it can help just one other person," she said, "it will be worth it."

For more information go to tna-support.org

Any donations are greatly appreciated! To donate money to the University of Florida research iniative please include this:

Check payable to: The Facial Pain Research Institute
(this is a division of Trigeminal Neuralgia Association, a 501(c) (3)-non-profit organization) Mark the check -Research-/Tom Wasdin Iniative
Mail Check to: Tom Wasdin 29 Riverside Drive #602 Cocoa, Florida 32922

Thanksgiving Part Two

2007-11-29T09:08:00.001-08:00

At Waldo...

GO GATORS....

Back at the Beach...

Steven and Hunter...

Back at the Wasdin's in Cocoa...

Kelsey...

Uncle Drew...

Isabella and Elizabeth...

Kelsey and Elizabeth...

Steven wins $100 by balancing the golf ball on the tee...

Elizabeth...then and now...

Tourists at Kennedy Space Center...NASA...

Greeting From Sunny Florida...

2007-11-21T15:55:00.000-08:00

Grandma in the news...

The before Thanksgiving pictures of Grandma's house...

Papa and his Princesses...

The Resort at Cococa Beach...

Sunrise on the beach...

On the way to the airport...

Delaney Turns 5...

2007-11-13T09:59:00.000-08:00

My Birthday at the Apple Orchard...

Followed by a party at "Pump It Up"...

Halloween at School...

2007-11-13T05:41:00.000-08:00

Hayden's dream finally comes true....
he's a Falcon's Football player!

(Hoepfully, Hunter, who's uniform Hayden "borrowed" will not see this photo)

Bella's 2nd Grade Class

Bella walks the parade

All I want for Christmas...

2007-11-13T05:37:00.001-08:00

Is My Two Front Teeth...

Sisters are the friends you have for life...

2007-11-11T19:41:00.001-08:00