Ask just about any South Miami-Dade high school girl who plays softball to name the most influential person in the sport and nine of 10 most likely will answer Gator Rebhan.

A 33-year-old bachelor, Rebhan has achieved almost legendary status within the ranks of area youth for his penchant for fielding winning teams on the softball field. This year he stepped into the high school coaching ranks, taking a contract position as head coach of the Palmetto High School girls' softball team and leading them to a shot at the state championship.

"It's been a lot of fun coaching these girls this year," said Rebhan matter-of-factly. "It was my first time coaching high school. I didn't know if I would enjoy it or not, so I had to try it. Eventually, I'd like to coach in college somewhere, but you need to coach in high school a few years before you can do that."

Rebhan also coaches the Miami Stingrays, a private summer softball team he formed four years ago made up of 11 girls gleaned from high school-level players throughout the county. In its second year, he led the team to national championships in the National and International Softball Association tournaments. And, had the American Softball Association playoffs not been curtailed by rain, Rebhan says firmly that his talented team would have added that trophy to its total and made a clean sweep of the recognized tournaments. As it was, the team never finished its playoff schedule and wound up in fourth place in the abbreviated ASA nationals.

"About four years ago I put together 11 girls and started playing travel ball," Rebhan explained. "The first couple of years, I didn't want to do it. I said I'm not giving up my summers. Then, my niece started playing and I ended up coaching her one summer and that was it, got hooked on it, got the fever of softball, gave up baseball and jumped into softball. It's a lot of fun, you get caught up in it."

A native Miamian born at Baptist Hospital and reared in south Miami-Dade County, Rebhan attended Sunset Park Elementary and Glades Middle School. He graduated Killian High School in 1985, where he was a standout baseball player, earning first team all-county honors as a pitcher in his junior and senior years. He went on to Miami-Dade Community College and again was a star pitcher, earning entry into the school's sports hall of fame with an 18-2 record over two years, best in the school's history.

With a Major League baseball career all but assured, Rebhan went on to the University of New Orleans on a baseball scholarship, only to have his dream shattered when he injured his pitching arm.
"Tore my elbow up," he recalled. "Tore up the tendons in the elbow and they said, 'You're done.' When that happened, that was it. I had to go out and get a job."

Dejected, Rebhan returned to South Florida, continued to study at Florida International University and then Regents College of New York, earning his liberal arts degree in 1992. He went to work for the Boys and Girls Club of Miami as unit director, a post he held for five years.

All the while, the baseball fires simmered and Rebhan found himself teaching kids the art of hitting in the backyard of his Kendall home. It became a gathering spot for any kid with ball-playing aspirations. One stormy afternoon in 1977, when the steamy Miami summer rains knocked out another backyard hitting-instruction session, Rebhan decided it was time to find a better way to teach.

"I was giving a lot of batting lessons in my backyard," he said. "We started getting a lot of rain that summer, so I decided to invest in opening indoor batting cages so I wouldn't have any rainouts."

He scoured the area, located a large vacant warehouse, rented it and established a palace of indoor batting cages that he appropriately dubbed The Hitters' Hangout, at 12950 SW 85 Avenue. It quickly evolved into a Mecca for young Miami-Dade athletes, male and female.

"It's really taken off," said Rebhan. "It's doing real well."

Rebhan's penchant for winning isn't limited to baseball and softball. Last fall, he volunteered as a football coach at Suniland Optimist in the 125-pound division. By the end of the season, his Suniland Sun Devils had compiled an undefeated and untied record, went on to win the national championship and finish with a sparkling 16-0 record.

"We're going to go to the 145-pound division this year and try to win another national championship with this team," Rebhan said. "We start August 1st and registration looks good right now. It looks like we're going to be loaded again, too. We've already got 30 kids signed up."

Rebhan modestly acknowledges his popularity with young athletes in south Miami-Dade County and concedes that his reputation as a winner helps to funnel talented players to his Stingrays in the summer, but says it doesn't help very much with the Palmetto High School team.

"As long as you win, you're popular," he said pragmatically. "If you win, they like you. You can't really take all of your players to your high school. So, we just deal with what we have from the area, the Howard-Palmetto feeder system, which is an excellent program. It helps us out a lot and sends us good ball players."

Rebhan says he hopes to be back at Palmetto High next year coaching the girls' softball team, but with some added responsibility.

"Next year I've got to be a teacher," he said. "This is the last year they allow contract coaches."