MIDWEEK REPORT / HIGH SCHOOL SPORTS UPDATE : Long-in-the-Tooth Wolverines

It’s beginning to look like another long season for the Harvard-Westlake baseball team, but at least the coaching staff needn’t worry about going gray.

First-year Coach Norm Greenbaum is 58. So is assistant Mel Swerdling. Hitting coach Kal Badran is 60.

The Wolverines’ “three wise old men,” as Greenbaum calls the trio, have more than a half-century of coaching experience among them. And with considerable success.

Greenbaum won three league titles in the past decade at Brentwood and Beverly Hills. Badran, the coach at Fairfax for 25 years, has won several league titles and a City Section 3-A title in 1990. Swerdling, longtime American Legion District 20 commissioner, has coached for more than 25 years.

Greenbaum succeeded Jim Brink, who retired after last season. Greenbaum immediately recruited longtime friend Badran, who hadn’t coached in five years. Swerdling had been an assistant to Brink the past four years.

Said Swerdling: “We have the wisdom.”

And a sense of humor--which helps at Harvard-Westlake.

The Wolverines, 4-20 last season, are 1-9 (0-3 in Mission League play) and have been walloped by Loyola, 20-2, Buena, 13-0, and Notre Dame, 24-0.

“I told them I’d help out only if they agree to have paramedics at all the games,” Badran said.

Said Greenbaum: “We’re getting creamed in the Mission League. A sense of humor helps when you’re being beaten, 20-2. Like Kal will say, ‘Norm, go out and talk to the pitcher.’ And I’ll say, ‘OK, where’s my cane?’ ”

Together, the three wise-cracking senior citizens are attempting to pump life into a team in need of more than just a shot in the arm. And while the team is low in the standings, morale is high.

“The kids give us a lot of respect,” Greenbaum said. “There’s no wise-cracking or talking back. They’re very respectful. Of course, if we were young studs, they’d be immediately receptive.”

Perhaps Greenbaum should speak for himself.

“I don’t consider myself an old man,” Swerdling said. “I throw batting practice the likes of which you’ve never seen.”

Adds Badran: “It’s not about age, it’s about energy. We don’t give the air of being old. If you saw us working with the kids, you wouldn’t think of us as old.”