TOPPING THE POP CHARTS

The transformation is nothing short of amazing.

A slick defensive catcher, with hardly any pop in his bat while in high school, turns into a feared junior college slugger.

He bats cleanup, belts home runs all over the place and makes people wonder how things changed so dramatically.

And it happens after wrecking a shoulder nearly to the point of no return.

Welcome to the Eric Ballew story, or the metamorphosis of a baseball player.

“It’s very pleasing,” Ballew said. “Especially with what I’ve gone through.”

Ballew, a freshman at College of the Canyons, is batting .364 with seven doubles and 34 runs batted in.

But the eye-popping stat is his team-leading 11 home runs, including four in Western State Conference play. His last home run was a grand slam against Oxnard last week.

The sudden power surge, even at Canyons’ hitter-friendly field, is remarkable because of one fact: Ballew hit a grand total of one home run as a three-year starter at Hart High.

“I called him the other day and told him he had reneged on us in high school,” quipped Bud Murray, Hart’s former longtime coach and now an assistant at Cal State Northridge. “Eric always had trouble driving the ball anywhere.”

Ballew, 6 feet 1 and 195 pounds, can’t fully explain the change. But, strangely, it might be connected to the shoulder damage.

The injury occurred when Ballew jammed his shoulder into a base while diving back on a pick-off play in a fall league game in October 1998. He knew immediately there was big trouble.

“My arm went completely dead,” Ballew said. “It was like dragging.

“It was torn in the front part and on the top part. They put some anchors in it. I had the arm in a sling for six weeks.”

That was followed by weeks of rehab and, finally, a return to throwing in February 1999. But Ballew was nowhere near playing shape and received a medical redshirt, sitting out a second consecutive season.

He was a redshirt the year before because the Cougars were set at catcher with strong-hitting sophomore Jesse Daggett.

Ballew used the idle time well. He concentrated on school work, earning his two-year degree, and on bulking up.

“He’s a seven-day-a-week weight-room guy,” Canyons Coach Len Mohney said.

Ballew went from a 175-pound player with warning-track power to a long-ball terror. His batting average, never better than the .315 he mustered his senior season in 1997, also improved.

That season, Ballew hit his only home run at Hart, a three-run shot against Placentia El Dorado.

“I was more of a defensive catcher [in high school],” Ballew said. “I really didn’t need to hit all that much. We had a lot of other guys who could hit.”

It’s all different now. But as recently as last fall, Ballew wondered if he would be ready for this season.

“I wasn’t sure if the shoulder would hold up,” he said. “The ball felt like a shot[put]. It took a while to get the motion back, the right mechanics. Sometimes during the fall, my arm felt numb and I thought there was something wrong.”

The arm is much stronger and Ballew hopes to showcase it at a four-year school next season along with his newfound power. He’s unsure of his destination, but catchers who can hit are always in high demand.

Especially stand-up guys like Ballew, who Murray calls “one of my favorite kids.”

Said Mohney: “It’s one of those stories about good things happening to good people.”