Apr 16, 2020 4 min read

Two things you have to like about Joe Maize, the former Peters Township High School athletic director and baseball coach, is his loyalty and the fact he’s never forgotten where he is from.

Though he spent 35 years coaching, amassing more than 400 career wins and doing it against opponents from the affluent South Hills and in one of the most difficult sections in the WPIAL, Maize has never been hesitant about telling people that he’s a Greene County guy at heart.

Maize, who earlier this week was announced as a member of the latest WPIAL Hall of Fame class, is proud that he is a Waynesburg Central graduate. He has deep roots in Greene County and he is still remembered fondly there, even if that creates a few comical moments.

“After I had retired, Peters Township was hosting the softball playoffs and West Greene was playing in one of the games at Peterswood Park. I think all of Greene County was following that team and was at the game,” Maize recalled. “I was helping direct traffic in the parking lot and everybody from Greene County who knew me would stop and say, ‘I see you’ve been demoted. You’ve gone from the athletic director to parking cars.'”

Maize’s father was a middle school teacher and his mother a school nurse in Waynesburg. They helped develop their son’s leadership skills, which blossomed when he became a multi-sport athlete for the Raiders and later as a baseball player at Slippery Rock University.

And it was during Maize’s high school days that he developed a relationship with a coach who today he still refers to as his mentor.

At Waynesburg, Maize played junior high football and varsity baseball for Raiders coach John Krajnak, who would go on to start the girls softball program at Carmichaels, building it into a WPIAL powerhouse, and become the Mikes’ athletic director.

“I consider John to be my mentor,” Maize said. “What I learned from John was to come to practice every day with a high level of excitement. If you know John, then you know what I mean.

“When I became the athletic director at Peters Township, I attended a Tri-County Athletic Directors’ Association meeting and John was there. He sees me, shakes my hand and congratulates me on becoming an athletic director. I said, ‘Thanks, Mr. Krajnak.’ John looked at me and said, ‘Joe, you know we’re colleagues, we’re both athletic directors, you can call me John.’ So I said, ‘OK, Coach Krajnak.’ To this day, I have never called him John. It’s either Mr. Krajnak or Coach Krajnak. That’s how much respect I have for the man.”

Krajnak said Maize’s leadership skills, which came in handy quite often during all those tightly contested baseball games at Peters Township, were apparent in Waynesburg.

“He played as a freshman, then started as the center fielder for me the next three years,” said Krajnak. “He was my leadoff hitter. He had a knack for always getting on base.

“Joe Mazie was the kind of player every coach likes to have. He was very popular and had great leadership instincts. He loved to be on the field. You could see what baseball meant to him. It doesn’t surprise me how successful of a coach he became. He always had that leadership skill. He was very mannerly, very approachable, very coachable. Everybody who played on teams with him saw that in Joe.”

Waynesburg lost in the WPIAL baseball finals in 1968, the year before Krajnak began coaching there. If there was one thing Krajnak and Maize regret about their time together on the diamond in Waynesburg it’s that they were unable to get the Raiders back to the title game.

“I had some terrific players and teams at Waynesburg, but that was in the days when only one team from each section made the playoffs,” Krajnak pointed out. “We couldn’t get past Buddy Grebb’s pitchers at California. And Dominic Christy’s teams at Carmichaels were always loaded.”