Legion Baseball / Steve Elling : ‘Screen Monster’ Gobbles Potential Extra-Base Hits at Chaminade High

When the right-field screen was installed at Chaminade High’s new baseball field, some thought it would be an instant boon--or boom-- for left-handed batters. Erected approximately 300 feet from home plate down the line and 330 feet in right-center, the 35-foot high screen has ultimately proven to be as fun as screen doors on a submarine.

For some, opinions changed faster than you can say short porch. As it turns out, there has been no outpouring of runs.

Or affection.

“At first, I thought it was great,” said West Hills Coach Jack Weiss, whose team plays its home games at Chaminade. “I thought all the lefties in the lineup would just absolutely go nuts. Then I started to hate it. Now I’m kind of so-so.”

The Screen Monster has taken away the extra-base hit to right field, Weiss says. Unless a batter really gets under the ball, he is usually held to a single.

“There are no triples and very few doubles,” he said. “Balls hit down the line are easy to handle and there is no power alley, so there are no gappers.”

Playing defense in right can be an adventure, too.

“There are two schools of thought on that,” Weiss said. “The net is pretty soft, but it has good spring to it. So you can play back, get the rebound and hold the runner at first.”

And because it is nearly impossible for a ball to be hit anywhere the right fielder can’t retrieve it in seconds, some choose to play a few yards behind the second baseman. If this sounds similar to the rover position in softball, it should.

“You can play real shallow and get away with it,” said Weiss, whose son Aaron hit .354 this season as a sophomore infielder at Chaminade. “We must have had three or four guys thrown out at first between all the varsity, JV and Legion games played there this season.”

Add screen screams: Weiss predicts that his son, who bats left-handed, will have an eyepopping senior season--at least statistically.

Aaron has two home runs in Legion play and leads West Hills (1-9) with six runs batted in.

But what will be his, uh, net worth? “He’ll probably hit 20 homers when he’s a senior,” his father deadpanned. “Everybody will be real impressed. Then they’ll get a look at that screen.”

Reverse Ks: Newhall-Saugus pitching ace Roger Salkeld, who set dozens of school records at Saugus High this season, once again generated quite a bit of conversation via the strikeout in Monday’s 5-1 win over Lancaster that gave Newhall-Saugus (6-2) first place in the District 20 Northern Division.

This time, however, retribution was at hand.

“Roger pulled the hat trick,” Newhall-Saugus Coach Tom Pedersen cracked.

Salkeld, who started in left field, fanned three times. The Lancaster bench, of course, immediately made note of this.

“They were on him pretty good,” Pedersen said. “They were saying things like, ‘Give him what he gives.’ ”

.... 98, 99, 100, whew!: When players on Woodland Hills East show up for practice, they leave their bats at home, but woe betide them if they forget their gloves.

First-year Coach Matt Borzello’s battle cry this year has been defense, and, in workouts, no batting practice is taken. If players wish to hit, they pop a few quarters into a machine at a local batting cage.

“We’re basically on our own as far as hitting,” infielder Rich Cosentino said. “He’s really stressing defense.”

Is that stressing out the players? Hardly, especially since the team is 6-1 and leading District 20’s Western Division. “I’ve noticed a difference (defensively),” said Cosentino, a starter for the Taft High team last season. “I’ve noticed improvement from the Taft team in others and in myself.”

Borzello, who directs the Tarzana-based Joe Torre Baseball Camp, hits each player 100 grounders in practice. Cosentino swears that No. 100 is just as wicked as No. 1.

“He hits them hard, real hard,” Cosentino said. “You can’t help but get better.”

Who is that guy?: Van Nuys-Notre Dame Coach Jody Breeden agrees that had he chosen to model a year ago the optic orange beach shorts he wore to Saturday’s Bernie Milligan All-Star Game, he might have been mistaken for a Caltrans truck.

Breeden, also a varsity assistant at Notre Dame High, has shed 80 pounds since last November. Breeden now weighs 260 and wants to shed an additional 20. Notre Dame High players, as an enticement to keep Breeden heading in the right direction, presented him with two pair of neon shorts at the team banquet last month.

Breeden has lost so much weight so quickly that some associates have failed to recognize him. At a District 20 game last Wednesday between Encino-Crespi and Glendale, Breeden waved several times to the umpires at the game--both had worked games at Notre Dame in previous years--and got nothing but blank stares and quizzical looks in return.

“I kept waving and they just stood there,” Breeden said. “I kept thinking, ‘What’s wrong with these guys?’ ”

As it turns out, he should have taken it as a compliment. Sunday, one of the umpires came out to Van Nuys-Notre Dame’s game against West Hills just to explain what happened.

“He said he just didn’t recognize me,” said Breeden, who hardly took the ump’s inadvertent slight as an insult. “But believe me, that’s something I can handle.”

The Ball Four: Reseda’s pitching quartet of Mario Valencia, Tony Holiday, Mark McClain and Joey Arnold has walked 64 batters in 70 1/3 innings and struck out only 47, yet the team is 6-3.

Sudden reversal: Joey Medaglia of Westlake-Agoura entered Sunday’s District 16 doubleheader against Ventura batting .000 (0 for 7). A few hours later, he was batting .500. Medaglia was eight for nine for Westlake-Agoura (9-2-1) in the two-game sweep and reached base on an error the only time he did not get a hit.

Medaglia, who will be a senior at Agoura High, hit safely in his first seven at-bats and drove in the game-winner in the opener with a two-out single in the eighth inning.