Living With a Loss : Frank Serna Resumes a Baseball Career at San Fernando High After the Murder of His Best Friend

The practice regimen has been mapped out for weeks, especially since Frank Serna, an All-Everything pitcher at San Fernando High last season, has had plenty of time for practice. Academically ineligible for the first half of the spring semester, Serna has been working out separate from the rest of the team, trying to stay sharp.

Because Serna has been in athletic limbo all season, Coach Steve Marden devised a training routine involving baseballs of different weights and colors, which, theoretically, should add strength to Serna’s right arm.

Serna, an All-City and Times’ All-Valley selection last season as a sophomore, is scheduled to start his comeback in Monday’s Mid-Valley League game at Birmingham.

Make no mistake, Serna is glad to be back, but it’s a safe bet he will not be spending much time thinking about Marden’s five-ounce, black baseballs. Serna already knows much, much more than he would like about dark, weighty issues: Monday’s game falls two months to the day after his best friend was murdered, only a few yards from Serna’s house, and only moments after Serna turned down an offer for a ride.

Serna is not just making a comeback, he’s coming back for a reason.

Reasons he wishes were different. All the wrong reasons.

It was late, around 3 a.m., but the passing hours had not helped provide Serna with any answers, nor a better sense of perspective. Officers from the Los Angeles Police Department kept asking for explanations of what he had heard. What he had seen. What he remembered. Anything he knew about Sam Crosby Jr. and any connections Crosby had with gang activity in the area around their homes, located a few yards apart in a residential area near Whiteman Air Park in Pacoima.

Twenty questions became 40, then what seemed like 100. One hour became two. Late evening had become early morning.

“They kept asking about everything,” Serna recalled this week.

He answered haltingly, choking back tears while relating what he knew about Crosby, his best friend since the two attended Pacoima’s Haddon Elementary School as first-graders. Crosby, 18, played on a summer league baseball team with Serna and San Fernando teammate Rudy Sanchez last year and graduated from Poly High in 1987.

Serna, 17, did his best to explain what had happened that night, although to a certain degree, he is still uncertain of what occurred.

Crosby dropped by Serna’s house about 8 p.m. on Feb. 25, a Thursday. Serna was asked to join Crosby and two friends, who were going out to grab something to eat. Serna, however, was expecting another friend to drop by and had school work to finish by Friday afternoon; the work took priority because his athletic eligibility was riding on the completion of several long overdue assignments.

Serna politely refused the offer, perhaps saving his own life with a nod of the head. Crosby put his girlfriend’s 1987 Suzuki Samurai in gear, rounded a corner, and sped away.

A few minutes later, Serna heard the gunshots. The next few hours, if not the next few days, remain something of a blur.

“All they wanted was the car,” Serna said. “They killed him for the car.”

According to the police report, a car slowed in front of Crosby as another crept up from behind. When the lead car stopped, the Suzuki was hemmed in. Police said one or more passengers, all in their 20s, emerged from each of the two autos and demanded that Crosby surrender the vehicle. During the argument that ensued, Crosby’s girlfriend grabbed the keys to her car and sprinted away. The third passenger and Crosby also ran.

“They all took off in different directions,” Serna said. “But Sam ran right down the middle of the street.”

The suspects fired several rounds. Serna heard the commotion from his front yard--a sound which shattered the evening calm of the quiet residential area.

Serna, uncertain of what was taking place, made his way to the scene, being careful to keep a low profile.

“I heard four shots,” he said. “Me and a neighbor went around the back way and saw them taking him away.”

After the suspects drove off, Crosby’s passengers loaded him into the Suzuki. Crosby, shot in the back and hand by what was believed to have been a .44-caliber handgun, was pronounced dead on arrival at Holy Cross Hospital in Mission Hills.

“Everybody thinks it was gang-related,” Serna said. “But he was a clean-cut guy. He was never involved in any of that.

“It all happened maybe a couple of hundred yards--no, probably only 100 yards--from my house. This is a tough neighborhood, but it’s not that tough. Nobody’s ever taken shots at us.”

Pam Humphrey, an officer with the Community Resources Against Street Hoodlums (CRASH) unit, said the crime was apparently random, and that Crosby was in the wrong place at the wrong time.

“It’s not a new M.O.,” Humphrey said. “But in that neighborhood, which is actually pretty quiet, well, these things don’t happen frequently there.”

Humphrey said CRASH investigators believe the suspects were probably gang members but that the likely motive was auto theft. Identifications of Crosby’s passengers, both 18, were not released for fear of possible gang reprisals.

Both witnesses have cooperated with police, Humphrey said, but the LAPD has yet to make an arrest in connection with the case. It remains under investigation by the anti-gang unit.

Serna drove to the hospital with Crosby’s father and remained there until 2 a.m. Serna helped try to console Crosby’s family, and then went to the LAPD Foothill Division office to answer questions for homicide detectives. He later spent a sleepless night at Crosby’s house.

The last thing on Serna’s mind was making up class work or worrying about baseball season. A million more questions occupied his thoughts as he tried to sleep.

He still asks, “What if?”

What if I had gone with him? What would I have done when they tried to take the car? Could I have helped him?

“I spent a lot of time thinking,” Serna said. “If I had gone with them, with my big mouth, they would probably have shot me, too. Or maybe I would have talked Sam into giving up the car. Maybe I could have calmed him down. Maybe it would have just been me instead.”

In a barely audible voice, Serna continued: “Baseball and school never even crossed my mind. Not once. He was like a brother to me, and I didn’t even care what happened with school. I wanted to quit. I didn’t want to play.

“I thought, ‘Why bother? Why go to school if I’m just going to get shot down in the streets like Sam?’ ”

The next day, he called Marden to explain what had happened.

“He was noticeably shaken and he was crying,” Marden said. “Frank is a pretty tough kid--most of these kids out here are--but something like this, hell, nobody should have to deal with that kind of a situation. And he had to deal with the pressure of clearing up the other things, too.”

Serna did not return to school for another 10 days, after serving along with Sanchez as a pallbearer at the funeral. During the soul-searching, Serna wondered whether baseball, or anything, was worthwhile.

“I just couldn’t handle the thought of going back right away,” Serna said. “But then I started thinking about all the things I had going for me, and I realized I had to play. I had to.”

Serna also had to deal with the guilt he felt for letting his teammates down. He had missed several classroom assignments and one test in a fall biology class. The teacher granted an extension, and all work was to be completed by Feb. 26, the day after the murder. Everyone expected him to be ready for opening day.

“I’m not mad at the teacher or anything,” Serna said. “What it boiled down to is that I should have gotten all of that stuff done sooner. I shouldn’t have kept putting it off. It was my fault--I had a second chance.”

Missing the deadline resulted in a failing grade, rendering Serna ineligible for the first 10 weeks of the spring semester. Serna, who is taking college preparatory classes, officially becomes eligible Monday.

Before Serna became ineligible, many picked the Tigers as a favorite to win the league championship, if not the City Section 4-A Division title. San Fernando had six of eight regulars returning. And with Serna (5-11, 160), who was 8-1 with a 1.43 earned-run average last year, the Tigers seemingly had a pitching advantage.

But San Fernando has struggled without Serna, posting a lackluster 5-4 record, 5-2 in league play. Serna has told players and coaches that he feels that his absence is partly responsible for the Tigers’ troubles.

“I know he’s been bothered by it, like he let the team down,” Marden said. “But that’s all over now, nobody is holding anything against him. He’s been at every practice--he hasn’t missed one--and nobody on this team is working harder than Frank Serna.”

Serna, however, said he feels pressure, whether or not it is self-imposed.

“I know the guys were counting on me,” he said. “I let them down. I thought I’d be eligible. I’m not saying I would have been the difference, but I think I could have helped.”

Yet, while Serna has been forbidden from playing, baseball has been his escape, his vent for frustration. Six weeks ago he never wanted to play again. Now, armed with a new sinking curveball, baseball has become cathartic. Doing well for his friend, who used to give him a ride home from every game, is his incentive.

“It pushes me,” he said. “It makes me mad. I do my fighting against the other team. It’s a different kind of fighting, but there’s a reward for this.”

Said Marden: “Frank is a dedicated kid. He will succeed, despite if you or I or whoever gets in his way. Other kids without his determination haven’t handled this kind of pressure. They’ve hung it up.”

Serna, street-toughened, does not wear his heart on his sleeve, choosing to show his emotions in other ways.

“When I get my letterman’s jacket I’m going to have Sam’s name sewn on it,” he said. “Right on the arm.”