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and become immune to it, but sometimes enough is enough,”
Ninestine said, adding he hasn’t ejected anyone from a game
in a few years. “I turn and point when there is a strike. This
guy was riding me hard so I started pointing directly at him.
Finally, his wife told him if he didn’t stop it, she was going to
get up and leave him. That was the end of that.
“Another time I had to break up a fight between two 6-foot,
7-inch basketball players. They were much bigger than me. I
pushed them both away and gave them both personal fouls.
It was a little bit scary.”
In 2012, Ninestine was relieved of duties as AD in what
was called a change in direction. He stayed on at Port St.
Lucie in charge of testing and as a coach. “When I was let go,
I put it up on Facebook and it agreed with what the administration
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had said,” he said. “The number of kids who commented
about me was overwhelming and humbling.”
During those five years, Ninestine immersed himself in officiating
baseball and basketball, usually four or five nights a
week. “I didn’t know what else to do,” he said. “You can only
pull so many weeds. If I had stayed at home I would have
gone crazy.”
“I work with some of the greatest people at Port St. Lucie
High School and my colleagues at other schools,” Ninestine
said. “We are rivals, but we are friends. It is all about the kids.
We have four teachers who graduated from here and at one
time we had six,” said Ninestine, who is also active in the
Florida Interscholastic Athletic Administrators Association,
having been a past president and an Athletic Administrator
of the Year.
“I love him and he is a great mentor and he is a friend,”
said Demery Brown, a 1997 Port St. Lucie graduate, special
education teacher and wrestling coach. “He’ll do anything
for anybody. He always wants you to be a better coach. You
mention a coaching clinic and he asks how much it costs
and where it is. He will always be Coach in my mind. I have
never, ever, ever called him Danny out of respect. He loves
Port St. Lucie High School and he may love it more than me
and I graduated from here.”
Ninestine said he would like to retire in seven years with a
total of 45 years in coaching and teaching.
“I can walk away any time I want,” he said. “But what other
job could I come to work for 38 years in shorts and sneakers?
One day someone is going to say to me, ‘You taught my
grandmother.’ ”
PORT ST. LUCIE HIGH SCHOOL
This vintage photo shows Coach Ninestine, left, offering urgent strategic
advice to a Jaguar football player.
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