Titans’ Offense Is the Star in Circus at the College World Series : Baseball: Cal State Fullerton’s performance ranks right up there with some wild comebacks in past tournaments.

“Five runs, four hits, no errors,” a bleary-eyed Jack Payne said over the public address system in Rosenblatt Stadium, following yet another Cal State Fullerton uprising Sunday night. “I’m batty!”

Payne, who has been entertaining College World Series fans for 31 years with his folksy, home-spun manner, has seen it all from his perch on Rosenblatt’s roof.

There was the wild comeback in 1972, when USC scored eight runs in the ninth inning to defeat Minnesota, 8-7, and earn a berth in the title game.

And the Arizona State-Wichita State game in 1984, when Barry Bonds went five for five and Oddibe McDowell hit one of the longest home runs in College World Series history to lead the Sun Devils to a 23-12 victory.

But nothing, Payne said, topped the Titans’ four-inning fantasy, when they batted around twice--sending 17 to the plate in the first inning alone--and scored 19 runs thanks to some timely hits and a collection of Louisiana State blunders.

“I’ve never seen anything like the first four innings,” Payne said during Fullerton’s 20-6 victory, which knocked the defending national champions out of the tournament and gave the Titans a berth in Tuesday’s elimination game against Florida State.

“Fullerton sent 36 batters to the plate. I’ve seen 11-run innings (the Titans’ 11-run first tied a Series record), but the nature of the inning, the way the play went, was just bizarre.”

The Tiger second baseman losing the catcher’s throw in the sun, turning a sacrifice bunt into a Fullerton run. The pitcher attempting to field a bunt, only to land on his rear.

The catcher apparently tagging a runner out at the plate, having his mitt practically torn off his hand, and the ball popping out at the last moment, giving the Titans another run. The third baseman throwing a possible double-play ball into right field, allowing another run to score.

Yes folks, this all happened in one inning, leaving the Series-record crowd of 20,682 scratching its collective head, wondering what else could possibly go wrong for LSU.

And on the lighter side, there was LSU All-American second baseman Todd Walker’s relay throw from shallow right field to third, which would have nailed second-base umpire Tim Henderson in the head had Henderson not sprawled onto the turf.

“It was a circus act for four or five innings, and Cal State Fullerton was the ringleader,” Walker said.

And the Tigers were on the other end of the whip.

Walker, the Minnesota Twins’ first-round pick in last week’s draft, is getting a little tired of elephants trashing tigers. Back in 1992, when Walker was the NCAA freshman of the year, Fullerton trampled LSU, 11-0, in a regional playoff game at Baton Rouge.

“They’ve outscored us, 31-6,” Walker said. “They’re our nemesis.”

At this rate, Fullerton will only have to play LSU once more in baseball to fully avenge the Titans’ 56-12 football loss to the Tigers in 1987.

Those Fullerton football teams were almost always embarrassed by big-name, national powers such as LSU, but the Titan baseball team is doing what it can to restore the school’s athletic image.

Fullerton has won two national baseball titles (1979 and ‘84), and Sunday’s victory marked the fifth time the Titans have dethroned a defending champion. Fullerton knocked 1974 champion USC out of the 1975 regionals, 1981 champion Arizona State out of the 1982 regionals, 1983 champion Texas out of the 1984 Series, and 1991 champion LSU out of the 1992 regionals.

This LSU team was obviously not as strong as the 1993 team, but few expected the Titans to handle the Tigers so easily, especially after Fullerton had only three hits in a 2-0, Series-opening loss Friday to Georgia Tech.

But this was a different Titan team than the tense group Friday that showed it hadn’t recovered from a whirlwind week. The Titans flew home from the regionals at Stillwater, Okla., last Tuesday and flew here Wednesday. They attended an autograph session and banquet Thursday and found themselves in a game against one of the nation’s top pitchers Friday.

“With all the travel and hoopla, we never got our feet on the ground,” Fullerton Coach Augie Garrido said. “We went out and worked and didn’t have any fun.”

A light-hearted, three-inning scrimmage Saturday, after which the Titans watched a Little League game, helped loosen them--and their bats--up.

“Everyone was pressing and not having fun,” said Titan second baseman Jeff Ferguson, who had two hits, four runs and three runs batted in. “But we started loosening up Saturday. We were cheering the Little Leaguers on, and today we had our best batting practice in a long time. Everyone was loose, having fun.”

That’s the key to success here, Garrido believes--have fun, play the game with reckless abandon. Don’t play tentatively. Don’t play to avoid making mistakes.

Of course, a little good fortune doesn’t hurt.

“I turned to (supervisor of umpires) John Bible in the third inning and said we’re wasting our time, we should be in Las Vegas,” Garrido said. “We’re the luckiest team I’ve ever seen.”