ANGELS : Fishel Glad to Get Second Chance

John Fishel had no problem securing a contract from the Angels. Fishel’s father, Gerald, simply called Angel scout Rick Ingalls, who talked to player personnel director Bob Fontaine, who remembered Fishel from his days at Cal State Fullerton and signed the outfielder without even seeing him play.

But preparing for spring training in his frosty hometown of Columbus, Ohio, now that was a problem.

“It’s not easy working out in Columbus this time of year,” said Fishel, who earned College World Series most valuable player honors while leading the Titans to the 1984 national championship.

“There’s snow on the ground so you can’t play on any fields. I played catch in the parking lot with some co-workers, rode a stationary bike and spent a lot of money taking swings at an indoor batting cage.”

To get in the right frame of mind, Fishel, 32, watched a video of 1984 College World Series highlights and some tapes from his brief major league career, which consisted of 19 games with the Houston Astros in 1988.

“That got my adrenaline going,” said Fishel, who hasn’t played professionally since 1990. “There’s one tape of a game when I got two hits off (Atlanta’s) Tom Glavine in Fulton County Stadium. I needed that to get the kid back in me.”

Fishel’s pro career took a turn for the worse after 1988. He was traded to the Yankees and hit .218 and .200 the next two seasons at triple-A Columbus. Then his life took an even more dramatic turn.

Working an off-season job as a truck driver in the winter of 1991, Fishel lost control of a 22-foot bobtail truck while exiting Interstate 5 in Orange County. The truck flipped, and Fishel avoided serious injury, but he suffered a deep gash in his left hand that required 29 stitches.

He couldn’t grip a bat properly and sat out the 1991 season. The Yankees eventually released him, and Fishel began working for a Columbus cabinet manufacturing company in 1992.

Fishel is married with three children, has a son from a previous marriage and fathered a daughter out of wedlock. He said almost half of his $28,000-a-year salary goes to child support, so it wasn’t a difficult decision signing with the Angels, where has the potential to make $115,000 as a replacement player.

“It was a no-brainer to come here,” said Fishel, a former Loara High standout. “My boss gave me a leave of absence and wished me luck. It’s an opportunity that doesn’t come around too often, so I’m going to take advantage of it.”

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Broadcast news: KTLA will televise two Angel exhibition games as scheduled, March 11 against the Padres in Peoria, Ariz., and March 18 against the Brewers at Tempe. But the station is developing contingency plans for its 50-game, regular-season broadcast schedule should the strike continue into April.

“There might be a curiosity factor for the first few games, but KTLA’s sponsors are expecting a 25-man roster that’s improved from last year, not a replacement team,” Angel President Richard Brown said. “The logical thing would be to push some (TV) games back. If the regular players return, I’d rather televise those games.”