Northridge Moves From Regional to Retooling : College baseball: With the loss of Sharts, Clayton to the pro ranks, Coach Bill Kernen will ask others to step up.

To compare a Cal State Northridge baseball team without Scott Sharts and Craig Clayton to the Yankees sans Gehrig and Ruth would be unfair. The Yankees didn’t ask Gehrig and Ruth to hit and pitch.

In the span of four days last week, Northridge lost 28.6% of its runs, 30.3% of its runs batted in, 43% of its home runs and 56.8% of its pitching victories when Clayton signed with the Seattle Mariners and Sharts agreed to terms with the Cleveland Indians.

The Matadors, 44-18-1 during their first season of competition at the NCAA Division I level, might also have lost a shot at gaining the pole position for next season’s race for a national championship.

“If I could have kept this team together, with Clayton and Sharts, I think we could have been the No. 1-ranked team in the country opening next season,” Northridge Coach Bill Kernen said.

Clayton batted .364 from the leadoff slot last season and also had a 14-5 record with a 2.25 earned-run average. Sharts batted .290 from the third position in the order, was among the nation’s leaders with 22 home runs, had a team-high 64 RBIs and was 11-6 with a 3.47 ERA.

Indeed, both qualified as heavy weaponry, but Kernen is confident that the Matadors still have enough of an arsenal to be considered dangerous. Having invested heavily in a pair of blue-chippers the past two seasons, the Northridge coach has announced his intent to diversify.

“We’re in a position now where other people have to pick up the production,” Kernen said. “We’re just going to have to spread our effort on offense.”

Truth be told, Northridge already has survived a prolonged stretch with only limited run production from Clayton and Sharts.

In the final month of the season, which included five regional playoff games, Clayton batted only .214 and Sharts .194 with one home run.

“They did the things they had to do at the beginning and in the middle of the season to get us in position, but the other guys took it from there,” Kernen said.

Most notable among them were Scott Richardson and Greg Shockey, both of whom Kernen expects to have at his disposal next season.

Richardson, who will be a junior, batted .453 the last month of the season, including .455 with five home runs and two doubles in the regional. Shockey, who surprisingly was passed over in the draft, batted a team-high .366, reached base almost half the time and was second on the team with 59 RBIs.

A healthy Denny Vigo also could help compensate for the loss of Sharts in the power departments. Vigo hit seven home runs and batted only .229 in an injury-plagued junior season after batting .300 with 19 homers as a sophomore.

“We’re going to miss the home run power; there aren’t too many guys hitting 20 or more,” Kernen said. “But Vigo has the potential to do that and we have some other guys--Richardson, (Mike) Solar, Shockey and (Kyle) Washington--who are capable of reaching double figures in homers.”

Despite recurring problems with his right hamstring, Vigo was a 27th-round draft choice of the Indians, but he is expected to return for his senior season.

“We’re going to miss them,” Vigo said of Clayton and Sharts, “but now it’s more motivation to show and prove to people that we can be a national champion-quality team even without them.

“They’re gone, so we’re going to have to work with what we have.”

Greg Shepard, an infielder who is transferring to Northridge from U. S. International University, probably will find a place in the lineup, but a bigger plus for the Matadors would be a return to form by switch-hitter Eric Johnson.

Johnson, a first baseman and outfielder, batted .284 and played in all but one of CSUN’s games as a freshman. Last season, he batted .216 and had only 97 at-bats. A starter early in the season, Johnson did not play in Northridge’s final 17 games and started only one of the last 26.

“Eric Johnson can help us,” Vigo said. “He has power from both sides, not tremendous home run power, but he hits from gap to gap.”

At his best, Johnson is a quality replacement for Sharts at first base. So the question becomes, what about pitching?

Ken Kendrena, who was 13-2 with a 2.75 ERA in his first full season dedicated to pitching, is the ace of the staff, the rest of which remains untested.

Steven Morales (Cerritos College) and Kevin Kloek (Citrus) have signed with Northridge, but they will have to make the difficult transition from the junior college ranks.

Marty Kilian and David Eggert, Kernen’s top JC pitching recruits from last year, both were inconsistent in their junior seasons. Eggert, a left-hander, appeared in nine games and had a 4-1 record with a 4.50 ERA. Kilian was in eight games, started five and finished with a 1-2 record and 5.20 ERA.

The equivalent of Johnson in the pitching department could be John Bushart, a left-hander who started the season in the rotation then all but disappeared.

Bushart started against Grand Canyon in Northridge’s third game, went four innings and allowed six hits, seven walks and five runs. He complained of arm soreness and never pitched again.

“That hurt us this year. Every team needs a good lefty,” Vigo said. “We were missing that. We need to go into a series with something different than three right-handers as the starters. There has to be that change of pace.”

As it was, Northridge survived rather well. The Matador staff finished the regular season with a 2.98 ERA, the second-best mark in the nation.