Cal Hi Sports Searching for a Financial Backer : Magazines: Failure of Califirnia Football publication would also jeopardize Cal-Hi Sports.

Carson-based California Football Magazine Inc., which also publishes Cal Hi Sports, has closed its office because of financial problems.

Co-founder Andy Bork, a former football star at Palos Verdes High, said that unless a major financial backer is found by June 15, publication will cease.

Long Beach businessman Russ Wendell pulled out of the project, which he helped fund since its inception in 1986, citing declining circulation and low advertising revenue.

“Everyone liked the project,” said Bob Rice, a business associate of Wendell. “But it wasn’t making money. Russ made the decision not to plow any more money into it.”

Rice and Bark refused to say how large the publication’s budget was, or how much money it lost. Wendell was out of town and could not be reached.

The failure of California Football Magazine would also jeopardize Cal-Hi Sports, a popular weekly publication that supplies reporters and coaches with prep statistics, rankings and game results. Founded in 1979, Cal-Hi Sports has been financed since May, 1989, primarily by funds supplied by backers of the magazine.

Cal-Hi Sports co-founder Mark Tennis said it is likely he will split with Bark and try to find his own funding.

“I do want to keep Cal-Hi Sports going,” Tennis said. “But as for next year, everything is up in the air.”

Tennis said he might scale back the publication in order to make it in the short term, but added: “I’m 30 years old now. I’m at the point of life where I don’t want to scratch and scramble (to put this thing out) anymore.”

The loss of Cal-Hi Sports would leave the state without a statewide information service, creating a big communications gap between regions, according to Scott Cathcart, director of media and public relations for the CIF Southern Section.

“Mark Tennis runs a good, well-organized effort to draw together a state that is fragmented by sections,” Cathcart said. “If it goes, it will really be missed.”

California is divided into 10 autonomous, geographic sections. Each plays host to its own playoffs, although in recent years the sections have joined to play host to some state championships, including its most popular event, basketball. Sectional participation is optional, however. Rankings provided by Tennis were used to evaluate teams for potential state playoff berths.

Cal-Hi Sports has grown from a grass-roots idea to “a respected source of state rankings,” according to Cathcart. It was co-founded by Tennis and his uncle, Nelson Tennis, while Mark was a student at San Jose State. Utilizing Nelson’s lifelong hobby of reading old newspapers at a Sacramento library, Cal-Hi Sports published the state’s first high school record book in 1981.

In 1985, Mark Tennis moved to Tracy, where he worked as the sports editor of the Tracy Press and published Cal-Hi Sports on the side. By the time he moved operations to Sacramento in the fall of 1987, Cal-Hi Sports had grown to more than 500 subscribers. Currently, it has more than 1,000 readers, who pay $39 a year.

During its 11-year run, the look of Cal-Hi Sports went full circle. Originally a typewritten news sheet that sometimes contained photocopied pictures, it became a slick-looking publication that included black and white photographs. But the closure of the offices for California Football Magazine forced Tennis to return to a typewritten press release format for his June issue.

California Football Magazine was created by Bark and John Prassas, a lifelong friend and former football teammate at Palos Verdes. It was published three times a year, along with a similar basketball edition. Originally it had offices in the upscale Hollywood Riviera section of Redondo Beach. Both the football and basketball magazines relied predominantly on correspondents to generate copy on high school, junior and senior colleges and professional sporting events. Mark Tennis was paid to produce stories about California high schools.

When Tennis agreed to merge Cal-Hi Sports with the football magazine, Prassas left the company to become a minister and Bark became publisher for both Cal-Hi Sports and the other magazines. Tennis was named editor for all.

Bark had high standards for his magazines and gambled that a slick tabloid published three times a year could make money on its subscription rate. He would not accept advertisements for tobacco or alcohol, which are major sources of advertising revenue in other publications, yet the magazine cost only $15 for six issues. It was often given away free at schools and businesses. Bark claimed a circulation of more than 200,000.

Although he reportedly found out about Wendell’s pullout earlier this spring, Bark continued with plans for an edition this fall.

Said one part-time employee who showed up for work in early May only to be told to clean out his desk:

“It was a shock to me. The way they were spending money, it led me to believe that everything was OK.”

In recent years a glut of preseason football publications has flooded both newsstands and sports departments. California Football Magazine was considered a good catch-all publication that lacked the depth of its competitors.