Pressure Increases as Baker Gets Older

He remembers the fear in the eyes of the pitchers as he approached the plate. How players he had never met always seemed to know his name. He remembers the sure swing, the countless home runs, the confidence that buoyed his spirit--and his step.

Derek Baker recalls those days--the glory days of Little League--then dismisses them just like that. He doesn’t have time for kid stuff. Not anymore.

Not with scouts scribbling down his every move. Not with fans expecting the world of him. Not with the whispers-- incredible potential . . . big-time prospect . . .--whistling in his ears every time he steps to the plate.

The expectations are ever-present, he says. The pressure is relentless. The situation, stifling.

Derek Baker is 16.

According to his coaches at Tustin High School, Baker, a sophomore third baseman, is destined for greatness. He has already shown as much, if not more, potential than Tustin’s much-heralded Shawn Green, who as a first-round draft choice of the Toronto Blue Jays, signed straight out of high school last June for $1.45 million, including a $700,000 signing bonus.

Green is something of a legend around Tiller town, making Baker the unofficial legend-to-be. Where Green was scrawny and awkward as a 10th grader, Baker is graceful and muscular at 6 feet 2, 195 pounds. Where Green was able to blast a few shots over Tustin’s fence--385 feet away--by the end of his junior year, Baker sent four over the fence last year as a freshman.

“Derek’s hit some balls harder than I’ve ever seen kids hit,” Tustin Coach Vince Brown says. “He has the best physical potential I’ve ever coached. He has the physical strength Shawn Green never had.”

And so it goes. Every time Baker steps on the field, he’s facing the Green Monster. Shawn Green this, Shawn Green that. It’s enough to drive a young boy bonkers. But Baker, a quiet type, doesn’t mind. He’s too busy admiring Green to notice.

“Shawn handled all the pressure so great,” he says. “He lived up to everyone’s expectations.”

Especially his own, which is all Baker wants to do. Right now, that’s as tough as anything. Until his two-for-three performance in Tustin’s 7-4 victory over University last Wednesday, Baker had two hits in 15 at-bats. A .133 average.

Baker says he realizes his output is a sign of the pressure, a signal for him to relax. Changes in his stance and his swing haven’t helped. And unlike most baseball players, he considers superstitions and good luck charms as plain old silliness.

Baker blames no one but himself. In a no-nonsense tone, he says he has no excuse, that he choked, that it has been “all down hill” since he struck out in Tustin’s season-ending loss to Estancia last year.

Not that anyone expected much from him last year. He was a freshman, called up from the junior varsity for a playoff game against Montclair. In his first at-bat, though, Baker calmly blasted a bases-loaded double over the first baseman’s head. The announcer let everyone know who the new kid was. The Tustin fans cheered. Baker came to the plate a second time, and doubled in another run. A hometown hero was born.

As Brown addressed the players after the victory, Baker says he went into a dream world. He mentally replayed his performance, and didn’t hear Brown’s order for an early morning practice the next day. He missed the practice and was relegated to pinch hit in the game against Estancia. He struck out swinging in his only at-bat. “The worst way to go,” Baker says with disgust.

Now, he is reminded--by his friends and his parents and all the trophies and plaques on his bedroom walls--that the talent that was always there is merely in hiding.

Don’t press, he is told. Relax. Let it happen. Just like when you were the hot-hitting terror in Little League, the boy with the .650 batting average, the kid who could turn a double play when he was 5 and hit a ball harder than some twice his age. The same boy who went on to help his team win the Colt League World Series last summer.

Baker doesn’t want to hear it.

“I’ve faced great pitching before,” he says. “I just think I should be able to handle it.”

Just as he should be able to handle all this talk about his future. Sometimes, he gets caught up in it, tells his friends that he’ll have no need for college once the pro teams come calling. “When you think about it, the money’s mind-boggling, but I don’t think about it too much,” he says.

“I should be able to handle all this,” he says quietly. “I shouldn’t worry about what other people think or what they say. When I was little, none of this really mattered.

“Back then, it was all just for fun.”

Barbie Ludovise’s column appears Wednesday and Sunday. Readers may reach Ludovise by writing her at The Times Orange County Edition, 1375 Sunflower Ave., Costa Mesa, 92626 or calling (714) 966-5847.