Kunes Performs Recital on Mound

There’s a search under way for the next great pitcher. It’s a wonderful game of hide-and-seek. You check out the Little League diamonds, the park leagues, the street corners, even the soccer fields, trying to spot your future prodigy.

Little did anyone know the 6-year-old soccer goalie who kept doing cartwheels during games to entertain himself would grow up to be the region’s best high school pitcher.

That’s the route 16-year-old left-hander Mike Kunes of Chatsworth High has taken. He’s the heir apparent to the likes of Randy Wolf, Jon Garland, Jim Parque and Jeff Suppan.

He possesses Wolf’s competitiveness, Garland’s poise, Parque’s feisty attitude and Suppan’s pinpoint control.

High school pitchers aren’t supposed to have three pitches they can throw any time for strikes. Kunes does. Whether the count is 3-and-0 or 3-and-2, he has complete confidence in his fastball, curveball or changeup. And then to see the ball hit the glove of catcher Loren Devries precisely on target only adds to Kunes’ expertise.

“I wake up in the morning when I know he’s on the hill and feel good,” Chatsworth Coach Tom Meusborn said.

This season as a junior, Kunes is 9-1 with a 1.52 earned-run average. He has 59 strikeouts and 17 walks in 69 innings with nine complete games. He’s batting .434 with 29 runs batted in.

His rise has come quickly. He pitched only six innings last season. But there were signs of his potential last summer during American Legion ball.

“The first game of Legion season, I didn’t even know his name,” Chatsworth assistant coach Matt LaCour said. “By the end, it was pencil his name in the lineup every game.”

Kunes was 11-1 and helped Chatsworth come within one victory of the Legion World Series. He pitched consecutive nine-inning complete games in the playoffs. There are college freshmen who can’t throw nine innings, let alone a 15-year-old.

This season, one local college coach who saw the 6-foot-2, 190-pound Kunes pitch told me, “I want that guy.”

He’s going to have to get in line.

“I think he’s pretty good right now, and man, in another year, if he gets a little stronger and adds a little velocity, he’s going to be even better,” LaCour said.

There’s so much more than Kunes, the pitcher. As the only child of two school teachers, he was taught to open his eyes and mind to other aspects of life, particularly music and academics.

He has a 3.4 grade-point average and took piano lessons for 10 years. At first, he wanted nothing to do with piano lessons.

“I kind of threw a fit,” Kunes said. “One thing, they had them on Saturday, and that was real bad.”

But like many teenagers who take time to reevaluate a parental decision, Kunes eventually realized his parents, JoAnna and Richard, knew what they were doing.

“My dad kept telling me, ‘Oh, you’re going to thank us later on,’ ” Kunes said. “It’s so true. I enjoy it now and am glad I did it.”

When he’s done with his homework or finds free time at home, he’ll sit down at the piano and play. It helps him relax, clears his mind and refreshes his spirit.

Last summer, when the team was in a hotel in Idaho for the Legion playoffs, Kunes went to the lounge late at night and played the piano. He didn’t know everyone in the hotel could hear on the speaker system. A woman came down to compliment him but Kunes didn’t have a glass on the piano for tips.

“I’ll bring a hat next time,” he promised.

Almost everywhere Kunes goes, he whistles. Walking to class, doing his homework, standing on the mound, taking a shower, he whistles. It’s another form of relaxation.

“People tell me I’m the best whistler they’ve heard,” he said.

Just don’t disturb Kunes on the baseball field. His coaches have learned to stay out of his way.

“He’s got kind of a bulldog mentality,” Meusborn said. “He’s a competitor and doesn’t want to get beat.”

LaCour felt Kunes’ wrath when he asked him not to pitch until outfielder Bryant Gant could tie a shoelace.

“I told him to step off the mound,” LaCour said. “He looked at me like the devil. It tells me he’s going to do what he’s going to do and, ‘Don’t bother me, you’ll get the W soon.’ ”

Kunes creates his own little world on the mound.

“During the game, I usually just talk to myself,” he said. “If I get behind, mentally I tell myself, ‘Challenge them, go after them.’ No one can hear me, but sometimes my lips move and people wonder what I’m doing up there. It’s an intensity factor. I try to get mad at myself and keep my mind focused. I kind of mumble here and there. People make fun of me, but that’s what I do.”

Kunes’ mother, JoAnna, principal at Madison Middle School in North Hollywood, figured the cartwheels he performed as a goalie were a warning.

“At that time, the conclusion I drew was Michael was not going to be a soccer player,” she said.

Kunes hasn’t done many cartwheels lately, but if Chatsworth wins the City 4-A title next month at Dodger Stadium, he might be inspired to try again.

Whatever happens, he’s on his way to establishing himself as one of the region’s best high school pitchers of the 1990s.

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Eric Sondheimer’s local column appears Wednesday and Sunday. He can be reached at (818) 772-3422.