Nashua Silver Knights manager Kyle Jackson chats with Nashua Mayor James Donchess during last Friday's champonship ring ceremony. (Telegraph photo by TOM KING)

NASHUA – It was a hot sunny day in late June a year ago when a championship team was born – and in some ways, a manager.

It was Nashua Silver Knights field boss Kyle Jackson’s third season in charge after half a dozen years as the team’s successful pitching coach.

Don’t be confused, he was no novice – as the pitching coach he developed, mixed, matched and weaved his staff’s way into back-to-back Futures Collegiate League championships (2016-17). The former Alvirne standout and Red Sox farmhand, with all the knowledge and experience, was the logical choice to succeed longtime manager/V.P. B.J. Neverett when he retired following the 2019 season. After all, the two had worked alongside each other for several years.

And then, in 2020, Jackson, with a veteran group, led the Knights to another title, having to deal with the rigors of the pandemic at the same time.

But it was last season when the team, and perhaps its manager, were at a crossroads. The Knights had looked listless in a mercy-rule loss to Worcester, the first game of a doubleheader. They were in danger of following their 2021 predecessors, a young team that season that never recovered from a slow start.

Jackson saw the signs, and was not about to let that happen again, especially with a somewhat older group.

So he addressed the team in between games.

“I gave them an ultimatum,” he said. “I told them they were just going to play, get your at-bats and stuff, and not care, or do they want to get something out of this. You want to put a good look. That was big for them. The year before we struggled, but we had a lot of people coming in and out. By the time the other kids showed up, we were in a hole we couldn’t dig out of. We made a run, but sometimes it’s just too little too late.”

So he challenged his team. But then Jackson threw in a wrinkle. He told his players that no fans were going to show up and pay to see what they were showing on the field.

“I also told them, ‘People come and pay their hard money and bring their kids to watch this game,'” Jackson said. “To watch YOU. To watch you play. And that performance that you’re putting out there, I don’t want to pay. They (the fans) do not deserve that. And as a coach that reflects on me what I’m putting out there. But at the end of the day, you’re the ones. It’s your college career. It’s everything, but they’re not going to cheer for you anymore. So have the option of coming back in Game 2, and going out and whether you win or lose, but if you give me 100 percent and lose, they will be happy. I will be happy.’

“It’s all about failure.”

And the Knights came back and won Game 2, the first of a long winning streak that put them in position to contend for a playoff spot. And as a result, they received FCBL championship rings this past weekend. It’s a championship that still surprised Jackson, who actually shed a few tears and was emotional immediately after the game and had to sit in the dugout for a few right after to settle his thoughts.

“It took me about two weeks to let it settle in after,” Jackson said. “I think a lot of people, including myself, were just in disbelief of like, that just happened.”

But now it’s business as usual.

“It starts by learning their names, getting a feel for who’s who,” Jackson said. “It’s different with position players, but with pitchers it’s more like ‘What did you do (in spring), are you a bullpen guy, are you a starter, how many innings?

“I explained to them in the clubhouse it’s a long season, don’t be worried if you’re only getting a couple of innings at the start. Everybody’s going to get their feet wet.”

Jackson has done this for a while, starting with 2014 when he was hired at the last minute as the Knights pitching coach. He knows that he’s just the latest of many voices these players have heard in the last few years.

“A lot of it is getting them comfortable with me being their coach,” he said. “Getting them comfortable with me being their coach, because now it’s a whole new coaching (staff).

“Like I’ve said before, it’s 40 guys who have to figure out how they’re going to become a team, and get to know each other.”

Communication is a key for Jackson. He didn’t want to tell his pitchers on what is a reduced roster for the first couple of weeks at the last minute they were starting one of the first four games, so he let them know before they arrived. He was hoping to avoid a bad start. But that wasn’t possible as the Knights are 2-8 going into tonight’s game at Vermont.

The message from Jackson remains the same: get the A for effort, and the results will take care of themselves with passing grades all around.

“It’s not just me,” he said. “It’s what these guys expect, and the fans. Not just me. I’ve already told them what I expect. Give 110 percent, win or lose, I don’t care. If you come out here and want to get something out of it and try to win, obviously, I’m happy.”

Jackson always knows he’s a target, mangers are always second guessed. He remembers the days when he heard from the fans in the seats “Bring back B.J.”

“I get that every year,” he said. “We won the championship in the COVID year (2020) and the next year we weren’t very

good and I heard it. And you know what? Fans can say what they want, and they have every right to.”

But Jackson has a great affinity for his players, every year, and their success and progress as players remains the most important thing to him.

“Last year, just seeing them become a team, knowing they weren’t the best team,” he said. “And knowing they had the most heart. They could have held their heads high if they had lost that (final) game.”

But they didn’t, and now in the current manager’s three seasons the Silver Knights have two championships.

“Each one is special,” he said. “The COVID year was very special because it was with the guys that I brought back. The older group. It felt like they wanted it. Their mentality was completely different instead of a younger group that ‘This is all new’, like scared. That team went out there knowing they were going to win it.”

Jackson makes no bones about it – he is in the right place.

“I love coaching,” he said. “As stressful as it is, I like watching the team grow. I can put out the lineup, but watching them, when they start cheering and supporting and doing things for each other, that makes coaching so much better. And it’s always sweet to win.”

One of the reasons Jackson was so emotional after the championshp was there was a lot of internal stress that had to be worked out. He had to adjust to a new staff, with then hitting coach Brendan Martin and pitching coach Spencer Bergeron, who opted not to return this year so he could concentrate on life in the real world.

“The in-house stuff was tough, for me,” he said. “I worked with B.J.and learned a lot from him. But there were things I never wanted as a head coach (for) an assistant coach.”

He didn’t know his coaches, and the philosophies were different, “and there was a lot of in-house stuff that everyone was emotional about.” But after the Fourth of July, Jackson and his coaches talked and reached an accord. Jackson was used to being, as he said, “a one man show” and the staff, including Martin, wanted to be more involved. In the past, he was for the most part alone in the dugout during games with a pitching coach often down near the bullpen.

“Last year I had coaches that stuck with me in the dugout and (would ask) ‘What are you thinking about?’ and I didn’t know how to deal with it,” he said. “I had never had it. … I’m very head strong.”

That changed as Jackson involved his coaches more.

“Once we got past that, it changed our dynamic, and the dynamic of the dugout,” Jackson said. “I love (Martin).I’m glad he came back.”

The pitcher who started the deciding Finals game last year, Noah Wachter, is now the pitching coach.

“He wants it,” Jackson said. “He has the drive for it. We were looking for somebody because we knew Bergeron wasn’t coming back. He called and wanted it. That’s going to be the biggest transition, he played with half these kids. And I told (the pitchers) you have to give him the same respect that you give me.”

No doubt Jackson has the respect of not only his players, but the fans, certainly Knights management, and the entire Futures League. In fact, from the days as a pitching coach, he always has.

But now he has that special memory of a Friday August night in Burlington, Vt.

“It’s in the top one of my favorite games ever, as a player or coach,” Jackson said. “As a player or coach, we just didn’t know where it was going to go. I always felt it we kept it close we’d give ourselves a chance. It was unbelievable.”

SUSPENDED GAME TO BE RESUMED

Friday’s suspended game with New Britain will be resumed as part of a doubleheader at Holman Stadium at 3 p.m. on Wednesday, June 21. It will be picked up in the top of the second but is now a seven inning game, as will be the regularly scheduled game following it.

The team announced tickets from last Friday’s game can be redeemed as flex tickets for any game for an equal or lesser value.

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