Ex-USIU Pitcher Flourishes in Arizona State’s Rotation

Never look a gift workhorse in the mouth. Jim Brock didn’t, and the policy has been paying dividends all season for his 14th-ranked Arizona State baseball team.

The Sun Devils outlasted the University of San Diego, 12-5, on Wednesday at Cunningham Stadium to improve to 16-8.

The winning pitcher--in his fifth complete game of the season--was Jeff Matranga, who improved to 6-2 and lowered his team-leading earned run average to 3.20.

Matranga, a 6-foot-2 right-hander who set numerous durability records at U.S. International during his first three years of college, would still be pitching for the Gulls, but USIU dropped its entire sports program last spring, and he was forced to look elsewhere for a place to play.

He has found a home in the Sun Devils’ rotation.

“Night and day,” is the way Matranga described the difference between USIU and Arizona State. “I went from the ghetto to the penthouse.”

In addition to money problems, USIU had been plagued with mediocre baseball teams for years before the ax fell on the Gulls’ sports department.

Arizona State, on the other hand, has won five NCAA championships and has made 15 appearances in the College World Series.

Come June, Matranga would like those numbers to be six and 16. He certainly is doing his part.

Taking a decision in all eight starts, Matranga leads Arizona State in victories, ERA, complete games and innings (64 2/3). With nine strikeouts Wednesday, he is second in that category with 51, and he has walked only 19 batters.

Three of those walks went to USD’s Kevin Herde, who once caught Matranga when they played together on a 15-year-old all-star team that traveled to Japan.

“I noticed his name on their roster,” Herde said, “but I didn’t make the connection until I saw him out there. That was the first time I’d seen him (since that all-star team). He’s picked up a little velocity.”

Matranga chose USIU after a strange high school “career” at Santana. There, he was 9-3 during his senior year, including a 1-0 (unearned run) loss to Helix in the 1988 San Diego Section 3-A title game. Matranga had been cut his junior and sophomore years.

“He’s a tough pitcher,” USD Coach John Cunningham said. “He keeps the ball down and got us fishing for balls today.”

Matranga said he was pleased with his outing, despite numerous distractions.

In the bottom of the third inning, Brock was ejected by plate umpire Jeff Patterson for arguing ball-strike calls, and Brock and Patterson proceeded to scream at each other from nearpoint-blank range for the next three minutes before Brock finally left the field.

“Despite the lack of the umpire’s help, I pitched my game,” Matranga said. “I usually let a bad umpire affect me, but this guy was so bad, he couldn’t affect me.”

Four Sun Devil errors, leading to two unearned runs, were more of a concern.

Arizona State never trailed, but this was a 7-5 game before the Sun Devils scored five runs in the ninth inning.

With the victory, Arizona State forged a two-game split with the Toreros, who pulled out Tuesday’s 4-3 game with two runs in the bottom of the ninth. USD is 13-12 heading into a weekend series at Santa Clara.

“It was a good series for us,” Cunningham said. “We used some people at the end to get ready for the weekend, and Arizona State is obviously a very good baseball team. I’m not unhappy about today. It just wasn’t a very good baseball game from either side.”

Save the workhorse Matranga.