HIGH SCHOOL BASEBALL ROUNDUP : Escondido Wins Avocado League Title With Tie

Escondido and San Marcos played through 90 minutes of rain delays Friday, slipped and slid all over the field trying to figure out who would be the Avocado League baseball champion.

After four hours, the verdict was still not in. Home plate umpire Mike Hart halted the game with the score tied 3-3 in the top of eighth with visiting San Marcos batting.

San Marcos Coach Ron Layton and Escondido Coach Bill Kutzner met after the game and decided to resume the game today at 11 with San Marcos batting with runners on second and third and two outs.

Unfortunately CIF rules say suspended games can not be resumed and therefore end with the score tied. Kutzner learned this when called Bob Merchant, the CIF assignment secretary for umpires.

“(Merchant) refused to assign umpires and he told me the rules,” Kutzner said.

Said Section Commissioner Kendall Webb: “In the San Diego Section, when a game goes five innings, it’s an official game. If one team is ahead, they win. If it’s a tie, then it’s a tie. Even if they want to play it off, they can’t.”

The ruling gave 10th-ranked Escondido (15-9-1 overall) the league championship with an 11-2-1 record. San Marcos (13-10-1, 10-3-1) finished a game behind.

Escondido will host West Hills and San Marcos plays at Santana Tuesday in the opening round of the 2-A playoffs.

A San Marcos victory would have gained the Knights a share of the league title and forced a coin flip to decide the Avocado’s No. 1 seed for the 2-A Section playoffs.

Kutzner said he will grudgingly take the league title.

“To me that’s like Little League,” he said. “This is about baseball. You decide who wins and who loses. It makes a whole lot more sense for me to show up in the morning and decide it.”

A steady rain initially halted play in the bottom of the fourth inning with San Marcos leading, 2-1.

“If it didn’t mean anything, we’d have been on the bus a long time ago,” San Marcos Coach Ron Layton said.

But since the game was critical to both teams, Hart waited more than an hour for the rain to stop.

Escondido took a 3-2 lead in the fifth inning when Joe Pippins and Jason Aguilar hit two-out singles, Scott Harms walked and Nick Terrazas laced a two-run doubled down the right field line.

The way Escondido starter Mark Redman was throwing, it appeared the Cougars would hold their lead. Redman had three strikeouts in the first three innings, but the 70-minute rest appeared to help his fastball. He struck out six batters in the final three innings, all on fastballs.

But with two outs in the seventh, Kyle Scott singled up the middle and stole second base. Charles Stringfellow then squirted a grounder in the hole between first and second. Escondido second baseman Vu Dang prevented the ball from going into right field with a diving stop, but the wet grass prevented him from regain his footing and Scott scored easily from second.

San Marcos reliever Denny McAdams struck out the side in the seventh to send the game into extra innings. As the seventh ended, the rain began falling again.

Hart waited for the lights to come on and rain to stop. After 10 minutes, he ordered play to resume. Jeff Huberts led off with a single and Curt Gallego walked. Juan Navarro sacrifice bunted Huberts and Gallego to second and third. Navarro almost reached himself after Escondido third baseman Chris Ellis slid while trying to field his bunt.

When the steady rain turned into a downpour, Hart finally called the game. Immediately, Layton threw a bat out of the dugout to protest Hart’s decision. But it was no use.

“After what we’ve been through, I don’t blame them for not wanting a shot at a league championship,” Layton said.

San Marcos has been besieged with injuries, illnesses and player suspensions. But after hearing about the ruling, Layton said he understood, sort of.

“A rule’s a rule and we have to live by it,” Layton said. “We’re disappointed and we felt we could have won the game.”