Scores of games already canceled
By Pete Borello, Town Crier Staff Writer
 photos Joe Hu/Town Crier The Los Altos High baseball team removes a tarp from its field last week. Tarps have helped preserve the baseball fields at Los Altos and Mountain View highs during the recent wave of rain. |
When Margareth Lundh awoke to the pitter-patter of rain early last week, she didn’t want to get out of bed. Another day of rain would mean another day of rainouts, which would mean another day of rescheduling games.
“It was the first day in 20 years I didn’t want to come to work,” said Lundh, administrative assistant in St. Francis High’s athletic department. “I can’t keep on top of it. There’s reschedules for the reschedules.”
At least Lundh can take some solace in knowing she’s not alone. All this wet weather has created scheduling nightmares for high school athletic departments and youth leagues throughout the area.
“I was about to get out the revised schedules and then it rained again and I had to throw them in the garbage can,” Mountain View High athletic director Dan Navarro said. “Trying to keep track of this is mind-boggling; I’m spending half my day on it.”
The soggy spring has affected baseball and softball more than other sports. Concerns over player safety and field damage have altered the standard umpire cry from “Play ball!” to “Play ball?” over the last month. Local teams at all levels have been forced to postpone multiple games. On the rare day it hasn’t rained, the fields haven’t always been fit for play.
“It was sunny yesterday, but the fields weren’t ready,” Navarro said last Thursday. “The kids want to play, the coaches want to play, but we also have to worry about liability and getting the fields torn up.”
Like the one at Mountain View, Los Altos High’s field is only a few years old and drains better than most, Eagles baseball coach Sandy Wihtol said. He and his coaching staff have diligently placed a tarp on the field during the rain, which has helped save it from being a diamond in the rough. Mountain View has been using a tarp, too, but it doesn’t cover everything. The bullpen was so flooded by midweek that Navarro estimated it would take two or three days to drain.
Some fields have been soaked so severely that players almost need to wear wetsuits under their uniforms to shag fly balls. When St. Francis’ junior-varsity baseball players went out to their field for a game last week, “they had water up to their ankles,” Lundh said.
In such instances, the home school has little choice but to cancel the game. Most games are called off by 1 p.m., giving the host ample time to alert the opposing team and the officials. At game time, however, it’s up to the umpires to determine whether or not to play.
“They use common sense and make sure (the field) looks playable,” said Robert Martinez, the president of Fermar, which supplies officials for all the high school games in Santa Clara County. “If the batter’s box is muddy, it’s fruitless. You have to consider how much moisture is on the ball and if kids are going to get hurt.”
When asked how many games have been canceled this spring, Martinez said, “I couldn’t even start to count.” On April 5, a day that started with rain and turned partly sunny by the afternoon, Fermar had 35 cancellations among the 43 baseball and softball games scheduled.
With no rain Thursday, most baseball teams were back in action. Local schools played scheduled games, rescheduled games and a combination of both. Mountain View visited Cupertino, while Los Altos hosted a doubleheader against Monta Vista. St. Francis played an unconventional doubleheader, visiting Valley Christian-San Jose in the afternoon and hosting St. Ignatius in the evening (for game results, see story above).
The local public schools are on spring break this week, leaving only four weeks to get in the rest of their league games before the Central Coast Section playoffs. Mountain View, in a tournament this week, will try to play catchup by squeezing in four league games in five days next week - weather permitting, of course. Los Altos is trying to add games next week as well, if it can secure umpires from Fermar.
“They said, ‘Don’t even ask - we can’t even deal with that right now,’” Wihtol said. “So there are a couple games up in the air after we get back.”
Martinez said Fermar is “doing the best to meet the demands, but we can only do so many (games) every day.” He added that Fermar employs about 100 baseball and softball umpires, “and I wish we had more.”
If the rain continues, there may not be enough umpires or days for teams to play their entire schedules. Navarro said there’s been talk of cutting the Santa Clara Valley Athletic League baseball season from 18 to 12 games, though such a drastic measure would have to be approved by the coaches, athletic director and principals of the member schools.
The league has already made one weather-related change, however. Wihtol said the SCVAL last week agreed to allow teams to elevate frosh-soph players to varsity throughout the league season, rather than just during the first round of games. This could help teams short on pitching; league rules limit pitchers to 30 outs and/or three appearances per week.
The pitchers have received plenty of rest in recent weeks, though, along with the position players. The rain has not only prevented teams from playing games but from practicing as well. Many of Mountain View’s practices have been limited to conditioning, playing catch in the gym - when it’s not being used for badminton or boys volleyball - and chalk talks.
Local youth baseball and softball leagues are in the same leaky boat as the high schools. Los Altos-Los Altos Hills Little League, Los Altos-Mountain View PONY Baseball and Mountain View-Los Altos Girls Softball are dealing with more cancellations than the FOX network. All are contemplating playing make-up games on Sundays, typically a day of rest.
“For every Saturday, for example, that it rains we lose anywhere from 35 to 40 games,” said Rob Ronconi, PONY president. “At this point we are trying to make them up, but that puts even more pressure on our fields, which are already committed to the maximum.”
Little League president David Rock is also concerned about finding sufficient field space for the volume of games to be played. At least finding umps shouldn’t be a problem.
“The good news is that we have a very strong umpire program, both the adult umpires at the Majors and Juniors levels, and our youth umpires at the AAA Minors level,” Rock said. “We will definitely have enough umpires no matter how many makeup games we have to schedule.”
That’s not the case for the softball league, which is putting out a call for those who call balls and strikes.
“We are currently reaching out to the community for umpires - a paid position in our otherwise volunteer organization - as when we start playing extra games, we anticipate a shortage in this area,” said league president Randy Hair, who urges those interested to e-mail chief umpire Pepe Hinojosa at uic@mvlags.org.
Hair added that his league, which recently added a field conditions page to its Web site, might have to extend the season a week or two to accommodate all the rescheduled games.
A little sun could go a long way in easing the logjam. It could also prevent Lundh from having another day like the one she had last week.
“I went home with a headache - a work-related one - for the first time ever,” Lundh said. “It’s like a joke, but it’s not funny.”
