Long Beach State baseball coach Troy Buckley community relating with Century Club President John Fylpaa.

A Sunday in the park: tales from the concourse at Blair. Or, how to fill a column without actually writing about a relatively boring college baseball series.

Nothing much in the scorebook to really excite the readers so I was feeling some pressure when I made my stroll from the friendly Crusader fans in the sunshine along the right field line to the left field gathering of Troy Buckley and his suddenly successful Dirtbags. Passing by the bleachers two questions poised were furrowing the brows of the 49er fandom.

My first stop was to seek out Dale Williams, the chief of umpires for the Big West Conference and my source for what happened on that infield fly rule that brought Buckley out of his dugout in a near sprint on Saturday, and later would lead to his ejection from the contest. Dale didn’t get to be a supervisor by not being a little cagey himself. “Hey Doc, what did you see?” I repeated the home team view that the umpires were not clear and demonstrative in calling the “infield fly” which in turn gave the LB youngsters the idea that the Valpo’s had merely dropped another ball. Dale’s interview with the crew from Saturday revealed that Chuck Lyon said he verbally announced the event as an infield fly to parties around second base.

“You see,” Dale began to lecture, “It becomes a fly ball when it is above the head of the batter and the catcher and it is an infield fly when the umpire rules that a player who made a ‘reasonable’ effort could catch it”.

Whew. In my days on this beat since 1975 I have never seen some much home town distress over a call in a game that LBSU eventually won. Remaining question: so how did the blue crew figure there should be two Niners called out when only one was tagged?

The second question on the minds of 49er fans was, “When was the last time the Dirtbags swept an opponent?” inference being that it must have been a really long time ago. Not so fast my friends, the Beach got three in a row just last April (over UCSB) and the year before (a lumpy 25-29 season) actually swept two opponents, UNLV and UC Davis.

Finally I make it down the ramp past a gaggle of parents who had sent their kids to a disturbingly organized line along the left field fence for the popular Sunday event, Run the Bases. Big Brian, the security chief, likes things orderly so he held the youngsters up while Coach Buckley finished his post game press briefing. Eventually the moms and dads became impatient and gave me the quote of the day, “Okay mister, now release the beasts!” Such a tender sentiment for progeny of all shapes and sizes.

NOW DUST FROM THE GAME—My pre-season hunch for the ace of the LB staff was Jon Maciel who got the Friday start at Vanderbilt but ran out of gas. Sunday he threw seven scoreless and got the win while his team got the shutout. Even better news was that the highly talented sophomore Richard Prigatano, under achieving in 2012, was 3-for-3 with both of Long Beach State’s RBI as the Dirtbags got the broom out defeating Valparaiso 2-0 to go on top of the 7-2 and 3-2 wins Friday and Saturday.

Maciel, who Buck figured would be a set up guy, was making his second start as a Dirtbag, struck out seven batters over seven innings, working out of any trouble while allowing just four hits on the day. The seven strikeouts from Maciel was the most for a Long Beach State pitcher on the season, and the Dirtbags finished without an error for the second straight day as the defense provided strong support for the staff as well.

Another happy note was the eighth inning effort of Josh Frye and the fine ninth inning work of Eddie Magallon. Magallon collected the save for Long Beach State the eleventh of his Niner career. The hitting high note came from the stocky slugger Ino Patron who doubled to lead off the second inning and was waiting there when Prigatano singled to drive him in. The Beach boys are hosting Seattle for a three-game series beginning Friday night with afternoon games Saturday and Sunday. The Redhawks, who employ former Beach ladies basketball legend Joan Bonvicini, play two mid weekers (BYU) before heading to LB, still stinging from losing three to Cal Poly at SLO last weekend.

FINAL FIGURING: The gala known as Jewels of the Night is still loading its website (JewelsOfTheNight.com) with details on delectable’s and auction items including trips and tickets. Take a look and you will find something to open your checkbook.

Century Club prexy John Fylpaa (pictured with Coach Buckley above) was an outstanding athletic leader and Dean at LBCC and has been innovative in Century Club programming this year including daring to let members play each other in softball, and this week in bowling.

We now close with unasked financial questions facing another “mid major”. This summer, the University of Central Florida will try to squeeze in replacing its basketball court between summer camps. Although the Golden Knights expect to increase their revenue long term by joining the Big East, there are some short-term costs associated with realignment.

For example, UCF will spend approximately $40,000 to change out the surface on their two basketball practice courts, basketball game court and volleyball game court to feature Big East logos in place of C-USA logos. In total, UCF will change out 18 conference logos in and around its athletic facilities…another $25,000 for existing conference signage and interior banners, then there are new uniforms, brandishing the Big East name ($250,000) plus $25,000 to change out logos on letterhead, etc.

Utah spent a little more on its move to the Pac-12. The athletic department says it cost approximately $52,000 to replace logos on the football field and basketball court. However, like Colorado, the Utes didn’t use their former conference logo around the office much, eliminating some replacement expenses. The Pac-12 provided additional signage for venues and new uniform patches, alleviating more of Utah’s costs. The only other large expense was for marketing efforts, which the athletic department says it spent approximately $75,000 on as it moved from the Mountain West to the Pac-12.

So my closing connection is that given the difficulty of opponents outside of the Big West (see the North Carolina, Ohio State, Syracuse, Arizona and even the SFA basketball game) hanging in with the Big West ain’t a bad idea after all.—DR. DAN