This is how a Florida Christian state title ring found its way home to Coral Reef coach

Opposing coaches don’t get asked to throw ceremonial first pitches.

Coral Reef baseball coach Chris Leon, though, didn’t think twice when he was invited to do the honors earlier this week at his alma mater, Florida Christian.

Leon, a catcher who led the Patriots to the 2005 state championship, didn’t know the real reason, though, he was asked to do it until Florida Christian’s public address announcer let everyone in on the big secret.

Leon’s state championship ring — the one he lost eight years earlier inside a McDonald’s bathroom in Fort Myers — had been found by a retired Navy man and his wife from South Carolina on a beach at Sanibel Island. And after searching the internet for clues, Charles Cato and his wife, Dottie, found a way to get Leon’s ring back to him.

“Those people, Mr. Cato and his wife … they will have a special place in my heart, and I’ll think about them every time I look at this ring,” Leon said.

The ring still fit Leon like a glove.

Much like it did after he first got it after helping the Patriots win the second of back-to-back state titles and finish that season on a 27-game winning streak which propelled them into the top 5 in Baseball America’s national rankings.

“The story is unbelievable and miraculous all at once,” said former Florida Christian coach Ernie Padron, who helped present the ring to Leon. “It’s a great chance to honor him. He was a big piece of our success that season.”

After graduating from Florida Christian, Leon went on to catch at Barry University and began coaching at his alma mater as an assistant in 2012. The following year, Leon was back at the state tournament guiding a new crop of Patriots.

He decided to wear his ring to motivate them in their own quest to win a state title.

“Only a few years earlier, I was the one in a dogpile celebrating,” Leon said. “I wanted to show them the ring to show them what they were playing for.”

Leon did what many do and took it off to wash his hands. In a moment of distraction, he returned to his car without it. By the time he realized it and went back for it, the ring was gone.

Leon had given up on recovering it and even considered having a new one made.

But the original had special meaning for Leon, who was also on the first Florida Christian team to win a state title the prior season. That year, he barely played due to some issues in school and didn’t want a championship ring made for him because he wanted to come back and earn one when he felt he had truly contributed to the team’s success.

“It just didn’t feel right to have a ring I didn’t earn [in 2004], but it completely motivated me the following season,” Leon said.

Leon has since gone on to coach the Barracudas for the past four years, leading the program to its best season ever in 2019 when they finished as a state runner-up.

Around the same time Leon began his stint at Coral Reef, the ring ended up discarded on a beach in Sanibel Island where it would be found again.

“We were trying to get to a beach area and walked through a wooded area with high grass,” Charles Cato said. “There was a picnic table there and something shiny caught my eye. We were like ‘what is this? This is a big ring. What in the world was a ring like this doing out here?’

“I thought about turning it in to law enforcement, but then I decided let me find out who it belongs to.”

The ring had the Florida Christian logo, the words ‘State champs’ and Leon’s nickname “Lion” inscribed on it. But that wasn’t much to go on for Cato in his search.

“I happened to see it in my jewelry box a few months ago, and I said to myself let me finally find out who this belongs to,” Cato said. “It’s been too long. I need to find out who the owner is.”

Cato found articles online about Florida Christian’s state championship teams and reached out to the school.

“Six weeks ago, I get a phone call from someone saying ‘I think I found something that might belong to one of you guys,’” said longtime Florida Christian athletic director Ed Riggan. “Charles described the ring to me and I was like yeah that’s definitely one of ours and when he told me it had the word ‘lion’ on it, I knew exactly who it belonged to.”

Cato had the ring shipped to the school soon after.

Riggan and Florida Christian coach Chris Brigman, then set up the presentation for Leon when he’d bring Coral Reef to play the Patriots this season.

Charles was able to watch the ceremony from his home in South Carolina via a livestream online.

“It’s kind of like when I wrote the letter…It chokes me up,” Cato said. “That ring means a lot to that young man. To be able to give something back that belongs to someone who fought hard to earn it means the world to me. I’m glad it happened and that the ring is back with its rightful owner.”

Leon said he was going to speak to Cato and his wife and planned to send them some Coral Reef gear to show his gratitude.

“Someone could have found it, wore it, lost it, or even pawned it,” Leon said. “It’s just incredible. I love how things can come back around like that.”

This story was originally published April 19, 2021 at 10:25 AM.