Tackling the Spring Identity Crisis

How competitive is Steve Marden?

“I’ve played my 7-year-old in Pac-Man and thrown his joy stick to the ground when he’s beaten me,” said Marden, the 40-year-old baseball coach of San Fernando High.

That attitude has helped turn the Tigers’ baseball program around. The team, which once usually found itself in the race for last place, is now battling for its first league title.

In the three years before Marden became coach, San Fernando was 4-41. Marden’s first team nine years ago was 4-11.

But the Tigers finished above .500 in 1978 and reached the playoffs. They have been in the playoffs the past three seasons, reaching the semifinals in 1983.

This year, Marden may have his best team yet. San Fernando is 9-2 in the Mid-Valley League, tied for first with Granada Hills.

Not bad for a school known more for football.

“When I came here San Fernando was a football dynasty,” Marden said. “When you’re City champs in football, by the time spring comes around, everyone is emotionally out of gas.”

When Marden started, he could barely field a team. Only 40 players showed up for tryouts in his first year.

This season, 145 wanted to play baseball. The ones good enough to make the team defeated Granada Hills, 11-4, last week to make the league race interesting. The teams could meet the last day of the regular season to decide the Mid-Valley champion, which may be the top-seeded team in the City playoffs.

“I think the baseball program is now on par to the football program,” Marden said. “I think football can no longer be a threat to us.”

Instead, the baseball program has become a threat to the rest of the City.