NAMES AND NUMBERS, BRUINS AND BEACH BOYS, ALL IN THE COOL BLAIR AIR

America’s Got Talent and so does UCLA Baseball. But you’ve got to admit that the Bruins are puzzling—after all, they were at No. 1 and are now ranked somewhere between No. 24 by Baseball America and No. 13 by Collegiate Baseball. Maybe their five games in one week schedule will help you decide. Tuesday night, the powder blue boys play at Blair, then host UC Santa Barbara at Jackie Robinson Stadium on Wednesday before a three-game non-conference series visit from Cal State Bakersfield beginning on that ominous date of Friday, May 13.

In their first mid-week matchup the Dirtbags (23-22) rallied to cut a five-run deficit down to one but the Bruins held on, added one more run and the Niners lost 6-4. Freshman Ino Patron was 2-for-3 at hitter-friendly Jackie Robinson. A month later, he still is the go-to guy for the Dirtbags hitting .321 with a team high .426 slugging percentage but the hitting revival of Brennan Metzger (up to .279)  has given some pop to the LB lineup when you also note the performance of Marjama (.305) and Hibbert (.296). Pitching, meanwhile, has more twists, turns and ups and downs than the Dow Jones. In the mid-week mix, expect guys like Jake Stassi, Kyle Friedrichs, Matt Johnson and the rest of the not yet in the weekend rotation committee.

NOTES ON MY NAPKIN—Saturday’s softball TV show on ESPN resulted in a pair of wild one run games (7-6 LB and 6-5 CSUF) and another ho-hum Erin Jones-Wesley 1-0 shutout… The lingering highlight for softball will be the home-run robbing over the fence catch by Hannah De Gaetano that checked at  #2 into ESPN’s Top Ten Plays list… Catching and passing Pacific for the outright Big West bid would be tough but doable but the RPIs get both teams in… Don’t forget that Saturday night in the Pyramid is the latest version of Jewels of the Night where you can low bid a lot of good stuff including a fleet of used cars carefully driven by some Ohio State football players, many with Lakers flags fluttering from the antennas…
 
No more college baseball at Cleveland State University after this season, as the school announces it will drop the sport in order to cover shortfalls in the athletic budgets in upcoming years… The program dates back to 1932 but has no on-campus or city facility to use… The rest of Tuesday BWC tilts are Cal State Fullerton at Pepperdine; Cal Poly at Saint Mary’s; UC Riverside at San Diego; Pacific at San Jose State; UC Davis at Stanford and Cal State Northridge at San Diego State.
 
That great freshmen class that Buck has brought in is similar to some guys you can watch this weekend at CSUF. The Titans love freshmen Michael Lorenzen, Jared Deacon, Greg Velazquez and Keegan Dale has come up big. Lorenzen was well known but Dale, who was released from UNLV, has a huge upside and still a youngster Jared Deacon is strong at the plate and above average in the field.
 
Name and number dropping. Former ‘Niner record holder Craig Kimber (first to a five-hit game in 1973) checks in from his Fresno home to say that the Bulldogs (dancing around in the Top 20) will put in a bid to host a regional…great facilities and a lot of civic $pirit if you get my drift… A not so good number, hard luck hurler Andrew Gagnon (2.73 ERA) now has 21 career losses second in the record books to Gary Randall 24 from 1976-78.