Looking out over the Chelsea High School athletic facilities he’s helped transform over the past quarter century, Wayne Welton stops a conversation mid-sentence and stands up.

Water has started to puddle on the pitcher’s mound, a sure sign that it’s time to hit the off switch on the sprinkler system.

Over his 32 seasons as Chelsea’s varsity baseball coach, Welton has used the landscaping skills he picked up in college to nurture the field into one of the finest in the state.

And the endless hours of attention he’s put into creating the enviable diamond is a perfect analogy for his 23-year stint as athletic director at the school district, a run that ends July 1.

Welton uses his own baseball analogy to describe his decision to retire.

“I never wanted to be that .190 hitter who stayed around too long,” he says.

Wayne Welton is retiring July 1 after 23 years as the Chelsea school district's athletic director. He'll remain the Bulldogs' baseball coach.

Rich Rezler | AnnArbor.com

At age 57, Welton is far from that. But combine a retirement incentive package with a desire to spend more time with his family and you have the end of an era.

He says he's too young to be done working, but he's not sure what's next. But one thing's for sure: It'll be in athletics, the only thing he's known in his professional life.

Hired as a health and physical education teacher in 1978, Welton spent time coaching a number of different sports. Baseball stuck, even after he was promoted to athletic director in 1988.

Being an athletic director is an around-the-clock job. A full day in the office is followed by a full evening of overseeing events. In Welton’s case, throw baseball practice and games into that mix, too.

“The way I approach the A.D. job doesn’t make it the right way or the wrong way, but you don’t ever look at your watch or your calendar,” Welton said. “And I was always OK with that. I would say I’d do it again in a second.”

While Welton agrees with an outsider’s assumption that being an athletic director is a tireless job -- so many of the tasks go unseen and unnoticed, he said -- he won’t agree that it’s thankless.

“If you’re waiting for somebody to walk up and say, ‘Hey, thanks for making this game happen today,’ you’ll wait a long time for that to happen,” he says. “But the thanks really comes in watching the kids play. That’s why we’re all here.

“The thanks comes in knowing you tried to do it right and the coaches and the kids are representing our community the way we want them to. For the most part, I think we’ve done that.”

Chelsea football coach Brad Bush credits Welton with building a school-wide culture of doing things “The Chelsea Way.”

“One of the things that made our situation unique was that Wayne was not only AD, but also a longtime baseball coach that led by example,” Bush said. “Everything he did with the baseball program was by the book and first class.

“He’s for many years been not only the dean of athletic directors in our league, but one of the most respected people I’ve ever been around. To lose somebody like that, it’ll be a huge change for us.”

The plan at Chelsea, after Welton submitted his retirement paperwork last June, was to hire a full-time replacement.

The district posted the position, received 187 applications from around the country and was planning to interview 10 to 15 of them before state budget cuts forced a change in plans and turned it into a part-time position.

Assistant principal Mike Kapolka will add oversight of the athletic department while maintaining some of his current responsibilities.

Welton, one of just nine coaches in state history with more than 700 career wins, says he will continue to lead the Chelsea baseball team until he no longer has the same passion for it.

From the sounds of it, that won’t be any time soon.

“My love for Chelsea baseball may only be exceeded by my love for my wife and my kids,” he says from inside baseball stadium press box, which includes an open locker full of his No. 1 Chelsea jerseys.

The baseball diamond will become his primary school workplace when he vacates the athletic department office tucked into a corner near the high school gymnasium.

“I can’t imagine when I walk out of that office how it’s going to feel,” he says. “It’s going to be really hard.”

Rich Rezler is a sports producer and copy editor for AnnArbor.com. Contact him at richrezler@annarbor.com or 734-623-2553.