Fullerton Baseball Job Has Perks, Pitfalls : Titans: The program is distinguished, but the man who replaces Larry Cochell will have to do a variety of tasks.

Stop at any of the nation’s major college baseball ports of call--Omaha, Miami, Austin, Tex., Wichita, Kan.--say you’re with the Cal State Fullerton baseball team, and you’ll never get the response: “Cal State Who?”

With two national championships and six College World Series appearances in the past 16 years, Fullerton is a titan among college baseball programs, much the way USC is in football and Georgetown is in basketball.

Why, a few weeks ago, former Fullerton Coach Augie Garrido saw a Japanese teen-ager wearing a Cal State Fullerton baseball shirt while walking along a street in Tokyo.

“That’s how big the program is,” said Garrido, who was touring Japan with Team USA. “If you go around the country and say Cal State Fullerton baseball, they’ll say, ‘That’s a great program.’ ”

But appearances, as Garrido well knows, can be deceiving.

“The program was a pretty good-looking house on the outside,” said Garrido, now the coach at Illinois, “but the plumbing didn’t always work and you weren’t sure if the foundation was going to hold.”

Garrido has been away from Fullerton three seasons, but the problems that contributed to his departure--lack of financial resources, lack of fan support, lack of a first-class playing facility--are still present at the end of Larry Cochell’s three-year tenure as coach.

They are the elements that may make it difficult for Cochell’s successor to succeed and difficult for the school to keep Cochell’s successor for a long time if he does succeed.

“Unless something changes dramatically, the (baseball coaching) job there still appears to be a stepping-stone situation,” Garrido said. “If they could have changed it, I think they would have for Larry.”

No matter who replaces Cochell, who resigned two weeks ago to accept the job at Oklahoma, it’s a good bet the Titans will be competitive in the coming years.

Located in the heart of one of the most fertile recruiting areas of the country, blessed with a favorable climate and a winning tradition, the school should always be able to attract top-notch players.

But, through no fault of its own, Fullerton doesn’t appear to have the resources to compete with other schools for top-notch coaches.

For many, the Titan job is still considered a plum position, and the school should have no trouble attracting an excellent coach. It’s just that the plums are ripening elsewhere, making it tempting for Fullerton coaches to leave.

Bigger schools--often schools with revenue-producing football and basketball programs--have been pumping money into their baseball programs. Many of the perks that college football and basketball coaches have enjoyed for years have been trickling down to baseball coaches.

Illinois attracted Garrido with a six-figure package that included income from summer camps and a daily radio show--not to mention a 4,500-seat stadium and strong fan support.

Oklahoma attracted Cochell with a six-figure package that includes summer camps, a radio and television program, a car and an annuity. And, yes, the Sooners have a nice baseball facility and solid fan support.

At Fullerton, the football and basketball programs barely generate enough revenue to cover their own expenses.

The school doesn’t have a nice baseball facility. Construction of the Titan Sports Complex, which will include a 1,500-seat baseball stadium, is scheduled to begin this fall and completed in 1992, but it could be several years before the baseball pavilion, which is to include a press box, concession stand and restrooms, is built.

The Titans have little fan support, with home games usually attracting a few hundred spectators, at best. The school has advertised the coaching position as having an annual salary of $55,464-$66,984, and the program, at least in the past, hasn’t had the kind of financial alumni and booster support that could supplement a coaching package.

“Pound for pound, we can’t compare to what other schools are offering,” said Steve DiTolla, Titan associate athletic director. “But we’ll do the best we can to maintain the baseball program.

“We want Cal State Fullerton to be a household word in college baseball. There are a lot of amenities here you can’t put a price tag on, and one is walking outside in January and hitting the ball every day.”

There are also a lot of amenities that the Fullerton coach has to put a price tag on, such as bats, balls and uniforms. This is another aspect of the Titan baseball job that makes it less attractive to some.

Most Division I baseball coaches are involved in fund-raising, but at Fullerton, the coach is directly responsible for raising about 40% of the annual budget, about $106,000 this past season.

Many college coaches raise money for new scoreboards, field improvements and other extra items, but the Titan coach raises money to sustain the program--to pay for the bare necessities. In fact, part of the job description is that the coach must “assume responsibility for generating financial support for the baseball program.”

DiTolla admits the responsibility has scared off a few coaches. Cerritos College Coach George Horton is interested in the Fullerton job, but when he was a finalist for the position in 1987, he withdrew because of the fund-raising burden.

“Any time they see six figures, they say, ‘Whoa, I’m responsible for that? You’re kidding me?’ ” DiTolla said. “That’s the consistent initial reaction, but when you tell them that a lot of these things are in place, it’s not as intimidating.”

Indeed, much of the fund-raising job for Cochell’s successor will be a matter of maintaining programs that already are in place. The outfield fence signs at Titan Field, for instance, generate about $25,000 a year, and Cochell sees no reason why those deals with advertisers shouldn’t continue.

Cochell also had a group of five boosters who helped with various fund-raising activities, and he plans to pass on those contacts.

“You have to raise a considerable amount of money, but I wasn’t the one guy doing it,” Cochell said. “I had a lot of support. I didn’t see it as a scary thing. It’s part of any job at a Division I university.”

But it’s much more a part of the Fullerton job than it is at most other top Division I programs.

At USC, Coach Mike Gillespie is involved in fund-raising activities, but it’s not part of his job description. He admits he would find the responsibility of raising more than $100,000 a year intimidating.

“I can see where certain people wouldn’t want to tackle that,” Gillespie said. “Everyone accepts the fact that you have to be involved to some extent, but to be told you are the guy, figure out a way to do it, that’s unusual.”

At Miami, the baseball program generated about $700,000 this past year, almost enough to cover the Hurricanes’ expenses. Coach Ron Fraser has become a legend in the promotional field, with such fund-raising events as a $5,000-a-plate dinner on the field and dinner on a cruise ship.

He even got a doctor to donate an open-heart surgery.

But $380,000 of the money raised this season came from gate receipts. And Fraser no longer oversees fund-raising. The school’s promotions department handles all the details, so Fraser can concentrate on baseball.

“I’m glad I don’t have to do it anymore,” Fraser said. “It’s a tough job selling baseball in a football world.”

Being a part of a lucrative football world has benefited many baseball programs, however. Louisiana State Coach Skip Bertman’s expenses are covered by the school’s athletic department, and he has booster groups that raise money for extra, luxury items.

He doesn’t have to sell outfield fence signs or program ads, yet the program still turns a profit most years, he said.

“The reason I’m where I am is we put 80,000 people in the football stadium every Saturday and we fill the basketball arena,” Bertman said. “Given a few bad years in both sports, and I’m back on the street again, begging for money. Not all schools can do that, and that’s what makes it hard for schools like Fullerton.”

Garrido can attest to that. Even though he was able to raise enough money to compete at a high level, the burden wore on him over the years. There were times, he said, when he felt like he was in the fence-sign, media-guide and camp business, not the baseball business.

“I was not moving ahead personally by developing these projects because the profits were used to sustain the program,” Garrido said. “The university pays for everything at Illinois, so I have time to develop things like radio shows, and I get revenues from those things.

“At Fullerton, there isn’t any time to develop yourself personally and to develop assistant coaches personally. You have to keep good people, and to keep them, you have to have benefits. That’s what Illinois does for me and what Oklahoma is doing for Larry.”

Despite his feelings about his departure in 1987, Garrido has expressed interest in returning to Fullerton. His three-year contract at Illinois expires in August and he has not negotiated a new one. Garrido said he eventually wants to return to Southern California.

But not if the circumstances surrounding the Fullerton job are still the same as they were when he left.

“I would have to be able to be in a position to identify problems and have the resources and opportunities to solve them,” Garrido said.

But can that ever happen at Fullerton?

“Let’s put it this way,” Garrido said. “It didn’t happen before I got there, it didn’t happen while I was there, and it didn’t happen to prevent me or Larry from leaving.”