Senior outfielder Matt Hibbert celebrates after scoring a run last week. Photo courtesy Long Beach State.
4:01pm | For the Beach record book it will go down as a break-even week, sort of a book-ender week. After all the 49ers won their Tuesday in extra innings, lost two games to Oregon State then went bonus baseball again Saturday night to beat the Beavers. And as is often the case, the Dirtbags seldom do anything without drama.
As the Post reported Tuesday, Long Beach survived Pepperdine 7-5 in 12 innings without their head coach Troy Buckley who was benched by the AD for a minor transgression relating to practice times. Several highlights serve as a transition to our theme for today, checking off items on Buckley’s bucket list. The Tuesday highlight was the fine work by the one-two pitching punch of Eddie Magallon and Nate Underwood who got the win and save.
“We’ve had a number of things that need to get right before conference,” the skipper said late Saturday. “We needed to set our rotation (check-Gagnon, Pinder and Stuart); find our closer (check-Magallon-Underwood); depth on our list of set up—mid game—guys (Friedrichs, Stassi, Frye); a fairly consistent line-up (Metzger, Hibbert, Avila, Bekakis in the outfield; Patron, Duffy, Singer and Marjama/Yamaguchi around the horn; and Murai, all 160 pounds, at catcher).” Oh yes, Buck also wanted to see progress in his offense—semi check there. Patron has 18 hits and works lefties and righties with equal effectiveness, Murai has the team’s best on-base percentage at .462 and there is an acceptable selection of DH-ers, Hill, Kim and McNeil. All the above hitters have room to improve, especially hitting curve balls.
For the purist, the Beach remains above .500 at 10-9 heading to LMU Tuesday afternoon for another non-conference contest. The pitching as noted has been excellent, the defense not so good. Thirty errors compared to 13 by the opposition. And RPI stuff, well LB now has six wins over top 25 teams, but that barometer only comes into play for teams with a good regular season record.
Oregon State, which appeared to be more beggars than industrious beavers, won the series 2-1 after losing by the same count last season. The LB win came on the back and bat of Ino Patron who singled with the bases loaded in the 11th inning of the third game and gave the Dirtbags a 2-1 win in 11 innings. Buckley acknowledged that his team “put ourselves in a bad position” in the controversial 9-6 loss. LB had a 2-0 lead after four, were tied 3-3 after six but then imploded (that was the word of Baseball America’s Aaron Fitt) with four consecutive errors giving up five runs in the seventh. Troy’s take, “We lost our composure.”
Apparently it was contagious, you see, since the Dirtbags trailed, 9-5, going into their last at-bats. The inning started on the right foot with Mike Marjama, Ino Patron and Jonathan Kim combining singles for a run. Jeff Yamaguchi, a high-potential freshman, then got everybody on their feet with a rocket to the base of the left field wall that skipped off the dirt, driving in two and making the game 9-8 with nobody out and Yama on second. But we warned you that you can’t spell Dirtbag without drama, and the theater arts majors in the visiting dugout, led by their producer director Pat Casey, flew off their bench and begged and cajoled the umpiring crew until they reversed the fair ball call. The sloppy work of home plate umpire Dick Flaherty (sort of raised his arms to belt level, then signals with his right hand that the ball is fair) was “indecisive.”
Buckley expanded in his post game press briefing. “The decision was influenced a little by the other team and (Flaherty) admitted he second-guessed himself,” Buckley said. “He said he didn’t see the ball off the bat and didn’t pick it up until the outfielder played the ball.
“His response made it hard for me to respond other than asking how the (first base ump) was in any position to make that call and that the other team influenced things, and we shouldn’t be penalized for that.”
Eventually, after some strong vocal reaction by the Beach fans, Yamaguchi went back to work and singled to load the bases, but the moment in time had passed and the next three guys couldn’t un-ring the bell. The OSU pitcher fanned Jake Stassi and Juan Favela and popped up Brennan Metzger. Game over, but trust me, karma yet to come to Corvallis.
The apple of the scout’s eye was Josh Osich, recovered from Tommy John surgery and like Friday’s OSU starter Sam Gaviglio, said to have major league stuff. Sam was in complete control in his 4-0 one hit complete game shutout. Osich gave perhaps the best outing of his career. The lefty went 5 2/3 innings, allowing two hits and a run while striking out a career-best eight.
NOTES ON MY NAPKIN— Rockies super scout and former 49er Coach Dave Snow said he was there to see Gaviglio, in fact he rushed down from the Pepperdine-Coastal Carolina game to see the clever righty who was dominant almost from beginning to end… He struck out nine of the first ten batters he faced and never having to pitch from the stretch, until Mike Marjama broke up his a perfect game in the eighth inning with a single up the middle. Dirtbag boss Troy Buckley said the 4-0 Beaver ace stayed “down in the zone and kind of crossed us up.” Drew Gagnon meanwhile was “up in the zone” according to Buck, and his 100th pitch came in the fifth while Gaviglio cruised and only used 99 pitches in his complete game victory. The ‘Niners made the Corvallis trip last year and lost the first game 16-4 but settled down and won the next two, 7-1 and 8-4. Next year the OSU Cali trip will be to UCSB in February.
BONUS DUST— From the Espy notebook, over 275 games in the minors since being a third-round pick out of Long Beach in 2008, Danny Espinosa hit .270/.365/.455… All the college pitchers will do better this year with the new and softer hitting bats so naturally someone is trying to hop the hitting up…. With a bat heater… As a paid spokesperson (just kidding), this is “one of baseball’s hottest new products this year…it protects and insulates bats by keeping them 32% warmer…translated a more reactive bat with less damage in colder temperatures and adds distance and velocity for the hitter”… Another pitching prospect ticketed for the Beach is Landon Hunt, a Moorpark High product and LBSU signee… He is 2-1 and had a 1.74 ERA as a sophomore, striking out 15 in 20 innings.
Just a hint of hoops. A lot of the home boys feel that the BWC should drop the idea of a postseason tourney in basketball as they did in baseball… One insider said it “is a money loser and takes away from the regular season work and no way does this conference get more than one team in the NCAAs”… And the crowds support that notion… Having said that, it was fun to see two old brown and gold quarterbacks at the Honda Center, Senior AD Bill Brady and Kevin Starkey, the VP of Operations at Honda Center since the place opened. If there’s a lock in this building, he has a key to it. Kevin played for Long Beach State in 1979 and 1980 and later in the CFL and the USFL.
Now about Gabe Romero and where are they now. If you put his first and last name together it does sound like somebody you knew as a college baseball player, but this guy is just an LBSU student with an asterisk. You see when the open tryouts for the Dirtbags ended they had 38 guys trying for 35 spots. (The next cut is to a 25 man roster, the limit for Big West games.) Gabe was knocking on the dugout door but just missed. So he is hanging in there, going to class and waiting till next year. Gold glover/silver slugger Evan Longoria keeps his hands sharp with his two favorite video games, Band Hero and Rock Band. “Plus I actually play the drums which helps.” Ok, helps with what?
Last add diamond news, 49ers softball (18-10) handed DePaul a 2-1 defeat in the Fullerton Tournament when Erin Jones-Wesley picked up the win and drove in the winning run in the bottom of the fourth inning of the first game. LB then used their freshmen star (1.60 and .375) to win their final game, a one-hitter over Illinois. That lifted her record to 9-3. Next up for Kim Sowder’s sweethearts of swat are home double headers on Wednesday with Ohio U and Friday with Canisius.