Notre Dame’s Garza Built Up Arm by Going Against the Grain

For sale: Large, plastic garbage can, mint condition. Loaded with pounds of uncooked rice. Make an offer. Call Notre Dame High , ask for Chris Garza.

Garza, a hot pitching commodity and potential commodities broker, doesn’t have much use for his barrel of grain anymore. After receiving a tip from former American League batting champion Rod Carew, he once used the rice to strengthen the muscles of his left arm.

“He told me, ‘Stick your arm in there and dig as far down as you can,’ ” Garza said. “There’s a lot of rice in there.”

As any discriminating diner worth his salt knows, rice goes well with just about anything. It seems that the regimen helped make Garza’s servings--a diving fastball and nasty curve--that much better.

Hitting one of Garza’s offerings is as tough as eating rice with a fork, and the proof is in the statistical pudding. Garza (8-0) leads area pitchers in victories, has an earned-run average of 1.45, already has thrown a no-hitter and has led the Knights to an 11-5-1 start. But around the Garza household, that is nothing to get excited about.

Garza gets his competitive nature from his dad. Steve Garza, 41, was a standout pitcher for Cathedral High in the late 1960s and continues to play an active role in his son’s career--as well as that of the whole team. Steve, an aerospace engineer, routinely removes his necktie after work and pitches batting practice. He exhibits pretty good stuff.

“He’s flat-out a bulldog and he can bring it,” Notre Dame assistant Jody Breeden said. “We call him ‘Tank.’ ”

Chris is called “Rock,” though stalagmite is more like it. At a slender 5-foot-11, 160 pounds, Chris longs to be a chip off the old granite block: Steve is 5-9, 220 pounds and built like a fire hydrant.

“I’m hoping those genes will kick in,” Chris said.

It took a few years, but Chris finally wears the pants in the family when it comes to superior arm strength. There were more than a few times when he and his father played burnout--a contest in which a ball is thrown back and forth at close range--and each went home with a beet-red, throbbing glove hand.

“We used to compete, but then we’d get in fights and be mad at each other,” Chris said, laughing. “Not bad stuff, but we were both competitive. We’d stop when one of us would be hurtin’ or something.”

Or when one threw the ball into the next county. Of course, there are times when the younger Garza still does that.

He has 69 strikeouts in 48 1/3 innings and has given up only 10 earned runs. But Garza has a way of keeping his dad and the rest of the Notre Dame faithful on the edge of their seats.

Garza has walked 44 and hit two, which means that nearly one player an inning has earned a free pass to first without putting the ball in play. Garza is headed in the right direction, though; last summer, in American Legion play, he walked 49 in 36 innings.

“It seems to go in streaks,” Garza said. “I’ll all of a sudden walk two or three guys in the same inning. I think I have to work on my mental outlook and concentration.”

Santa Rosa Cardinal Newman got his attention immediately in a tournament game Friday, scoring two runs in the first inning. Though Garza sweated out a 5-4 victory--he struck out 12, walked five and threw 120 pitches in 93-degree heat--it was one of his toughest decisions.

“They got a couple off me right away,” he said. “Then I struck out six in a row.

“I was bitter.”

Bitter, bigger and better.

Add Garza: For the makings of a well-rounded meal, boil some of Garza’s white rice, then solicit the help of a handful of other area baseball standouts.

For a dose of vitamin C, call Granada Hills catcher Sam Voita, whose family owns a citrus company.

For the main course, call Montclair Prep pitcher Russell Ortiz, who works at a pizza parlor in Sherman Oaks.

For dessert, drop by the ice cream shop in Woodland Hills where El Camino Real pitcher Jason Sipperley serves up banana splits.

Footballs and strikes: What month is it, anyway? Don’t ask El Camino Real right-hander Evan Howland, who has brought cross-training to the prep level.

Howland, a pitcher who was quarterback of the football team last fall, has been doing a Nolan Ryan act on the sideline. Between innings of his start against Taft on Wednesday, Howland played catch behind the backstop with a football--a technique Ryan uses to warm up.

Howland said his decision to use the football is the result of evolution, not imitation. While playing winter-league baseball on Saturdays in the fall, Howland said he noticed that he had considerable zip on his fastball.

“I was throwing the football during the season and pitching during the weekend, trying to become an actual factor on the baseball team,” Howland said. “The fastball seemed to take off and I had more consistency with the curve and slider.”

Once baseball season opened, however, the extra gas disappeared. Consequently, Howland went back to throwing a football two weeks ago, despite the howls of teammates. Soon thereafter, though, others followed suit. Catcher Justin Balser and a number of teammates have started using footballs to loosen up before games and practices.

Howland said that Mike Maio--the school’s football and baseball coach--mentioned that pitchers for the Texas Rangers sometimes toss footballs as a training technique. Howland concedes that he doesn’t know much about the whys, just that the process works for him.

“I don’t know anything about physiological reasons,” he said, “just that it helps my fastball.”

It is difficult to argue with the results: In his best outing of the year, Howland (3-0) on Wednesday recorded his first complete game and held Taft to six hits in a 6-1 victory that moved the Conquistadores into a share of first place in the West Valley League. He lowered his ERA from 3.50 to 2.80.

Dueling Dalton: Next stop, the state record book.

Glendale softball standout Jenny Dalton entered her senior year three shy of the Southern Section mark for career home runs, but it took a while to get there. If Dalton continues at her recent clip, however, the state mark might be within reach.

Dalton failed to homer in Glendale’s first 11 games but caught fire last week. She clubbed three homers in two games to tie the section career mark of 23 set by Gina Karpinski of Charter Oak from 1982-86. The state record is held by Dee Dee Phillips of Laytonville, who hit 29 from 1979-82.

If Dalton hits one more homer, it will give the region the section longball champion in softball and baseball. Scott Sharts, now a farmhand with the Cleveland Indians, hit 32 home runs for Simi Valley from 1986-88.