Sabolic Gains Passport for Baseball Adventure

Everyone has heard stories too unbelievable to fathom. Jason Sabolic is about to experience one.

He was born in Van Nuys, raised in Canoga Park and Northridge. He was the backup catcher on El Camino Real High’s 1997 and 1998 City Championship teams. He enrolled at Occidental College to become a doctor and play baseball.

Now comes the part that causes even his friends to roll their eyes in disbelief.

On July 8, Sabolic will board a plane at LAX, fly to Chicago, take a connecting flight to Munich before landing at his final destination, Zagreb, Croatia, where he’ll spend four weeks training and playing for the Croatian national baseball team.

“I’ll tell you what, it’s some kind of adventure for someone who’s never been farther than Pittsburgh to visit family,” Sabolic said.

Sabolic didn’t own a passport until a few weeks ago. He doesn’t speak Croatian. Asked what he knows about Croatia, Sabolic said, “Absolutely nothing.”

Sabolic is 21 and old enough to vote, drink and buy a car, but that didn’t mean his mother, Joanne, was simply going to let her baby head off to a former war zone without a level-headed discussion.

“She pretty much bit her lip,” Sabolic said. “She absolutely wants to say no and be a typical mother, but she thinks it will be a wonderful opportunity.”

Sabolic can thank his great, great grandparents for his Croatian descent. They came to America in 1917 from Yugoslavia. Sabolic’s father, Paul, an assistant football coach at Kennedy, was born in Pittsburgh. Sabolic’s mother is Jewish.

“I’m the only Croatian Jew you’ll ever meet,” he said.

He ended up on the Croatian national team because of a slip of the tongue.

Sabolic was talking to Oscar Marcelino, father of Occidental player Brad Marcelino, who’s a member of the British national baseball team. Sabolic mentioned he was Croatian. Marcelino knew the coach of the Croatian national team. The next thing Sabolic knew, team officials were paying $1,200 to fly him to Zagreb.

“I’ve finally gotten the opportunity to prove my abilities,” Sabolic said. “I was just overwhelmed. It’s something I couldn’t pass up and something I’ll remember the rest of my life.”

Sabolic, a 6-foot, 200-pound junior, has been sharing time at catcher for the last two years at Occidental.

Instead of conducting research for the kinesiology department this summer, he’ll spend about a week in Zagreb training at a new 15,000-seat stadium, then depart for tournaments in Italy and Germany.

It takes courage and self-confidence to leave home for a foreign land. Sabolic’s decision was made easier by a traumatic experience during his senior year.

On the eve of El Camino Real playing in the 1998 City final at Dodger Stadium, Sabolic played in a pick-up ice hockey game and was checked violently in the knee.

“I played football, baseball and hockey for five years and never got injured once,” he said. “Not a stitch.”

He went home with a painful knee, but he didn’t worry.

“I’m cool to go,” he said. “I was in school and 12 o’clock comes around and my leg is swelled five times the normal size. The pain was unbearable. I think, ‘This can’t be happening. We’ve got a championship game to play at Dodger Stadium.’ ”

Sabolic went to a pregame gathering at teammate Mike Leduc’s house.

“I’m sitting there writhing in pain,” he said. “I don’t want to show anybody because I feel stupid.”

Leduc’s mother finally asked him, “What’s wrong?” Sabolic showed her his leg, prompting him to call his mother. They went to the hospital emergency room.

“I think you have a blood clot,” the doctor told him.

It was 3:30 p.m. The bus was departing for Dodger Stadium at 4:30.

An orthopedic surgeon informed him that he had two options. He could go home and risk losing the leg, or have emergency surgery.

“I was out of surgery at 5:30 p.m.,” he said. “They cut me from my knee to my hip. I spent a week in the hospital, with four surgeries, a skin graph and 91 staples.”

Sabolic went to graduation in a wheelchair and was back playing sports in three months despite warnings he might not be able to play baseball again.

When deciding whether to leave for Croatia, Sabolic remembered how he felt when told his baseball career was in jeopardy.

“I learned from my accident that life is so short,” he said. “I could have settled into a life of mediocrity. Who ever gets this kind of opportunity to do something like this? If I pass this up, it would be stupid. I thought, ‘God, I have to do this.’ I’ve been working myself to the bone lifting weights, throwing, running, hitting.”

He found in the family garage his father’s old college textbooks on the Croatian language. He’s trying to learn more words than “beer” and “where’s my village.”

Sabolic will be among 20 players on the Croatian national team, but no one should worry where his loyalties lie.

“I’m still a Valley boy,” he said.

It never ceases to amaze me how many ways there are for high school students to transfer within the L.A. Unified School District.

First there were opportunity transfers, then came magnet programs and finally open enrollment.

Now comes another legal transfer vehicle. It’s called the school for advanced studies. It’s for students with high test scores and good grades. Chatsworth is one of several schools starting the program this fall, with 120 openings.

Among the students who applied and were accepted in the Chatsworth SAS program are All-City infielder Ryan Braun of Granada Hills, All-City pitcher Greg Acheatel of El Camino Real and top freshman infielder Bryan Petersen of L.A. Baptist.

“If they come because they’re smart and want to play baseball, we’re happy to have them,” Principal Dan Wyatt said.

If all three come, Coach Tom Meusborn can sleepwalk to the 2002 City title.

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Eric Sondheimer can be reached at: eric.sondheimer@latimes.com