THE HIGH SCHOOLS : Was it Fair, or Did Crespi Foul Up Again?

It’s as much a ritual as spring cleaning. A baseball season ends and Crespi High starts looking for another coach.

Mitch Fair is the latest in a long line of Crespi baseball coaches to leave the program after one season. That’s seven coaches in the past nine years if you’re keeping score.

Crespi finished this season with a 9-14 overall record and 4-8 and in sixth place in the seven-team Del Rey League.

Paul Muff, Crespi athletic director, said some players and parents had privately expressed displeasure with Fair in conversations during the season but added that Fair was not asked to resign. He said Fair, a walk-on coach, resigned on his own.

But Muff added that the school had “strong reservations” about retaining Fair anyway. “Mitch sensed some of our dissatisfaction,” Muff said. “The team and individual players didn’t perform to expectations.”

Coaches from at least two of Crespi’s league rivals question the fairness of any “expectations” at all. They say that retaining the same coach for at least three years is essential to building a successful program.

Jim Ozella recently completed his third season at Alemany. The Indians have improved each year under Ozella and were 17-10 this season. He said a new coach needs time to gain the respect of players.

“I don’t see how you can make an evaluation on someone in one year,” Ozella said. “I made a lot of mistakes my first year because I didn’t know the kids. When you make demands in your first year, kids sit back and say, ‘I don’t know about that.’

“When a coach makes a commitment and the administration backs him, the kids realize it and are at ease. My seniors next year will have been in the program for four years. You can’t believe what a difference that makes.”

Fair spoke in April of putting a lock on Crespi’s revolving door.

“I don’t want to be a one-year wonder like the rest of them,” he said. “I’m trying to get something going here. Every year the coach has to introduce himself to each player and I’d like to be the one to stop the trend.”

Ed Riley, coach of league champion St. John Bosco, left the school in 1976 and returned in 1979. He had to reacquaint players with his style of coaching upon his return.

“It took a couple of years to get kids back to my way of thinking,” Riley said. “Continuity makes a successful program. I’m really surprised at what has gone on at Crespi because Paul Muff does one heck of a job with his basketball program.”

Muff has coached Crespi’s basketball team to four Del Rey titles in five years and has a 10-year record of 169-75.

“The fact that our system from the freshman level on up is identical is certainly a key,” Muff said. “The kids know what to expect.”

Fair, a former assistant at Campbell High in San Jose, knew not to expect many victories after watching early practice sessions. The players were not fundamentally sound--possibly because they had been coached by someone new every season.

“I’d tell a kid to bunt,” Fair said this week, “and he’d look at me like I thought he couldn’t hit.”

And because Crespi doesn’t have a field on campus, it was difficult to teach the basics. The Celts practiced on a dirt softball diamond at Balboa Park and played home games at Valley College.

“The only difference for a home game is that we batted second,” Fair said. “Students can’t be expected to support a team that plays miles away.”

Muff admitted that baseball is not as important on campus as basketball, football or track. And he agreed with Fair that as long as games are played off campus, nothing would change.

“Baseball is an intimate spectator sport at Crespi,” Muff said. “Parents are about the only ones who attend games. There isn’t the campus spirit we get at football and basketball games.”

But Muff insists he wants the same kind of stability for Crespi baseball.

“Yes, I’d like to find a baseball coach who is relatively permanent,” Muff said. “But unless we have a teaching position open, which is unlikely, we’re looking at another walk on.”

Said Fair: “The school doesn’t really care about baseball. And that attitude rubs off on the kids. For many of them, baseball was just a reason not to go straight home every afternoon.

“They can get by and make believe, but Crespi will never be a force in the Del Rey League until a program is established.”