LJ g lax vs. Coronado 4/29

Photos by Ed Piper

LJ baseball: Roberts ties complete game record

"Robbie" Roberts displays the fungo bat

he uses, after hitting flies to Viking outfielders

before LJ's game at Coronado April 19.

(Photo by Ed Piper)

By Ed Piper

Cole "Robbie" Roberts, the crafty lefthander who pitched a Viking playoff game at the end of his freshman year, tied the LJHS complete game career record with his 2-0 shutout of Coronado on April 17.

The confident, relaxed senior, who was a skinny beanpole in that freshman start on the road three years ago, is reportedly powered by some tasty no-sugar-added lemon hard candies--one of which he stored in his uniform pocket for later use in a recent outing--from an unnamed sportswriter who has covered the Viking baseball team.

Cole's total for this season is four complete games, with nine last year as a junior. That combined 13-complete-game total ties him with the existing school record.

He can break the record Wed., May 1, with his next scheduled start versus fellow league powerhouse Scripps Ranch at home at 4 p.m.

"Robbie" carries a superlative 7-1 won-lost record this season, with a microscopic 1.42 ERA. He is 3-0 in Eastern League play.

The Islander outing April 17 marked his third shutout of the season in nine starts and 12 total appearances--including two shutouts in league play.

The Vikings presently (April 28) sit in a tie for first place in the Eastern League standings with Scripps Ranch at 5-1. Coach Gary Frank's team is 16-6 overall.

LJ baseball: Frank 30th coach with 300 wins

Gary Frank (far left), who reached 300 wins

at La Jolla High April 17, leans in as coaches

and umpires go over the ground rules

before the Vikings' game at Coronado

April 19. (Photo by Ed Piper)

By Ed Piper

On Wed., April 17, La Jolla shut out Coronado at home for a 2-0 victory.

The win marked head coach Gary Frank's 300th career win. The former Viking star player, now in his 21st season as head coach at his alma mater, became the 30th coach in the San Diego Section to achieve that level of wins.

Over the past two decades, the former pro second baseman--who learned how to throw right-handed as a youth so that he could play an infield position other than first base--has had six squads with 20 or more wins.

Entering the 2024 season, Gary was already the winningest coach in Viking baseball history, with 287 wins, forging ahead of luminaries like Bob Allen (1990-2003), his immediate predecessor and present assistant coach, and Allan Lamotte, who was at the helm on the old campus field from 1968-1981.

LJ track @ Dick Wilkins Frosh-Soph event 4/27

Leilani Hill (left) takes the baton from

Viking teammate Zoey Hagan, both

sophomores, to run the anchor leg

in the girls 4x100-meter relay

Sat., April 21. La Jolla's time

was 54.72.

 (Photo by Ed Piper)

By Ed Piper

The Viking all-sophomore relay team of Presley Loyd, Haleh Maheronnaghsh, Zoey Hagan, and Leilani Hill ran the 4x100-meter relay in 54.72 at the annual Dick Wilkins Frosh-Soph event at Del Norte High Sat., April 27.

LJ track: Smoole to focus on sprints

Leed Smoole warms up

at the LJ-Canyon Hills-\

SDHS track meet

April 18 as a plane

flies over the campus.

(Photo by Ed Piper)

By Ed Piper

"This is what I'm going to focus on (the sprints)--no more rugby, no more football," Leed Smoole, a sophomore at La Jolla, announced to a sportswriter at the La Jolla-Canyon Hills-San Diego High School tri-meet at SDHS Thurs., April 18.

"This is what I do. You can't make a lot of money from it. Well, maybe you can. But this is what I'm going to focus on," elaborated Smoole, as he warmed up for an imminent race.

The statement carried a little zing to it, because the flowing-hair Smoole (a brotherly trait he shares with his since-graduated brother Wyn) played a critical role on the Viking varsity football team's defensive platoon in Fall 2023. This was kind of the flowering of the younger Smoole's athletic career, as he got--and continues to get--much bigger, lifted weights, matured, and began to come into his own.

 

LJ football: Torrey Pines at home week 2

Viking QB Hudson "Huddy"

Smith, a sophomore, warms up

before a 20-6 loss at home against

Rancho Bernardo Sept. 8, 2023.

(Photo by Ed Piper)

By Ed Piper

A little birdie told me yesterday (April 25) that the La Jolla football team will host Torrey Pines in week two of the 2024 season.

This is quite a step up from seven years ago--and especially 11 years ago, when the Vikings' program was in desperate need of boys to go out for the program, as the school's fortunes in that area dwindled.

The little birdie is Mike Livingston, a science teacher on campus at Torrey Pines High, who is also the head JV coach for the Falcons. Livingston let me know in a surprise visit. Livingston, a likeable and popular teacher with an outgoing personality, sits in the booth above the field during varsity games, and is well-versed in the in's-and-out's of the North County school's program.

I said, "You know you'll be facing the new quarterback (Huddy Smith), who can really sling it." He seemed aware, and I'm sure Torrey Pines' football staff as a whole will be totally caught up on Hudson's, as well as other members' of the Viking offense proclivities, habits, and patterns by Aug. 30, the scheduled date of the contest at Edwards Stadium on the LJHS campus.

For the past seven years, Coach Tyler Roach has pushed his Viking athletes to (1) play both ways, when that is appropriate; and (2) be prepared to play tougher opponents.

La Jolla has a continuing rivalry with Scripps Ranch, whom it has met in the playoffs, as well as in league play. LJHS also has a rivalry with Mira Mesa, another tough, grinding opponent.

In the old days, since the bloom of Viking football 1991-1995, when the team won league titles each season (long before my time covering the team), La Jolla maybe shied away from some of the tougher teams. There was heart, but not enough energy to face these good teams and play them on an equal basis.

Torrey Pines will be a good test. On the Falcons' campus, not only football but also basketball, volleyball, and other sports, both male and female, receive the support and funding from the administration and staff. It is not uncommon to find yet another staff hire, teaching in a classroom, who is a coach in a particular sport that Torrey Pines has sought for leadership and acumen.

These are my private opinions. They have nothing to do with public policy or statements. But over the last couple, even several, years, one can perceive a pattern that points to a campus-wide emphasis at Torrey Pines on promoting athletics. One of the impetuses is the rivalry with North County power La Costa Canyon, which has a similar ethos and emphasis.

Both schools recruit, or draw, athletes who are looking to compete for teams that play at a high level in Open Division or Division 1. There aren't too many pushover teams.

Meanwhile, La Jolla has a proud tradition of athletics alongside academics. LJHS graduates are no slouches in the preparation they receive toward college and future careers.

LJ g beach VB 1, Torrey Pines 4 - CIF Open Division playoffs - 1st Round (of 4) - 4/25

Photos by Ed Piper

Emma Garrett dives for the ball in front of

teammate Daniela Vinolo during the 5's match.

Lindsay Laumann, a senior lefty,

does an acrobatic hit during the

1's contest.

Junior Katie Murray goes to her knees for a bump

behind Kira Shepanski for the 3's.

Emma Garrett (5's) skies for a hit.

LJ 5's: Junior Daniela Vinolo (left)

and sophomore Emma Garrett

LJ coach Carol

Welcher with

baby Welcher

at her first

playoffs. Will

daughter be 6'2"

also?

Senior Lana Ferrell (17) goes away from the action

to try to save a pass against TP's ones.

Roll for first choice in the 1's match.

Viking lacrosse: 'A different sport'

Viking goalie Pixie DeLeon (left) holds the ball

in anticipation of starting the offense

at Cathedral Catholic Mon., April 15.

(Photos by Ed Piper)

By Ed Piper

A few weeks into the spring sports season, I had the opportunity to attend a Viking girls lacrosse game, then a few days later a Viking boys lacrosse game.

Wow.

While the girls' game emphasizes athleticism and finesse--you can't put your stick near an opponent's face--the boys' game was a smasher/crasher that collided with my kinesthetic sensibilities.

I was struck (though not literally, though I've been hit multiple times by a ball in play or a player as I cover high school games right next to the sideline) by the pure joy of the guys wanting to generate contact.

Many of us males, testosterone-driven, love to experience the thud of hard, sharp contact. I loved it back in my day in high school sports, though my brother and I were banned from football by our mother's edicts when we were young because of her brother's injuries in ice hockey.

The sharp contrast between the boys and girls games really came home as I watched. I've covered both sports for multiple years, I've taken a lot of photos, I've written a few stories on my blog. But it really delivered this time: fine movements, sprinting action, calling out plays as the "striker" has the ball or passes to a teammate before receiving it back. I'm talking about the girls' game.

Senior Logan MacLean (29) of La Jolla tries

to score against Skyline (WA) April 12.

Way on the other side of the chasm, I viewed Seigo Lavinsky and gang in the boys' game a few nights later, the hard pounding as a defender shadows an opponent with his stick, the rough-and-tumble contact when offense/defense vie for the same position--even taking out the opponent if the referee interprets it as "going for the ball".

The approach of coaches outline the difference in the two games. The women call out encouragement, plays, formation patterns. They're not wimpy, but it doesn't lead to physicality.

Meanwhile, Coach Adam Morawski (hired a short time before last season's opening game) in the guys' game (both teams play super-late in the evening!) presided over huddles that reinforced a need to hold the line, use their bodies as much as necessary to apply pressure on defense and try to alter play patterns to stop or delay scoring.

One parent, on the sidelines to take photos of his son when an out-of-state team came to Edwards Stadium, reacted when I mentioned this difference: "It's a different game."

I totally agree.

Book review: The Cincinnati kid

By Ed Piper

Over the last few days, I have devoured the 400 pages of a new book released this spring on Pete Rose, the master of singles, the all-time hit leader for the Cincinnati Reds (and later, the Philadelphia Phillies). He agreed to a lifetime ban from baseball's active list, which also means he cannot receive votes for or be voted into the Hall of Fame.

It's a lot to devour, but I was fascinated, driven forward to continue reading Keith O'Brien's well-written piece, Charlie Hustle: The Rise and Fall of Pete Rose, and the Last Glory Days of Baseball, because the account is so compelling. If there's any doubt, Rose did do it: he bet on baseball, he bet on his own team. That is why he is banned.

Later in 2021, after COVID restrictions were lifted and the inveterate memorabilia autographer returned to the unofficial circuit and began signing bats, books, uniform jerseys, and any other items a person would pay $59 to have signed, Rose began signing six words--"I'm sorry I bet on baseball."

The whole episode is pretty sad, told in immense detail gained from O'Brien's research and interviews with Pete Rose himself, his wives and mistresses, his bookies and go-fers who handled all his bets and hid his pregnant girl friend while his wife Karolyn and two kids lived in Cincinnati.

We are taken back to the incredible struggle that the future baseball star made just to rise in Cincinnati, his hometown, after failing his sophomore year in high school at West High (formally Western Hills High), committing himself to baseball, the one sport where his small size at the time would allow him to excel just off effort and fanatical (should I say compulsive?) practice. Rose played his "second" sophomore year when he returned to school, then his junior year, but high school rules in Ohio at the time didn't allow him to play during his senior year due to an age limit (not the case in CIF here in California, with many "holdbacks" playing in all sports as older seniors).

So he went to what we now call travel teams, and made his grade there, outside of school.

His father, a local semipro football legend, Big Pete, made his son fight-fight-fight as a puny little kid by consigning him to a trainer who used an empty swimming pool as the boxing ring. Little Pete learned to use his fists, after getting walloped in his initial training bouts.

It's quite a story of, literally, fighting your way up through the ranks and all the circumstances that can drag you back down to become a hometown hero.

Pete Rose bet all along. That's how he spent his free time. With his later contracts supplying him enough money to place bets, support his family, and his mistresses as well, his habit became a compulsion that, from all reports, became an addiction that he just can't control--and refuses to seek help for.

So Rose, who eclipsed Ty Cobb's immortal hit total near the end of his career, signing with the Phillies because he couldn't get the money he thought he deserved from the Reds and leading the Phillies to a World Series championship, continues his double-speak, unable-to-tell-the-truth vigil at autograph tables in Las Vegas as an 80-year-old, banished from having contact with other people in baseball due his lifetime agreed-upon ban.

His former friends, including ones who placed his bets and carried his wads of cash to pay off the gambling debts, say all he had to do was admit he bet on his own team, accept then-Commissioner Bart Giamatti's punishment (Giamatti died soon afterward of poor health), and go on tour talking to young people and others about the evils of gambling. But he just couldn't, and wouldn't, do it.

Every MLB clubhouse door has the rule Pete violated posted on it about betting on one's own team. Pete Rose walked past that sign every time he entered the Reds' and Phillies' clubhouses. When he took the added step of not just betting on football and basketball, but now baseball, too--and his own team--he had gone a bridge too far, seemingly too far to ever come back. He has lost his family, his kids, all his old friends. A lesson to be learned, from an outstanding athlete and ballplayer who made the most of his skills on the field, but who couldn't duplicate the same in his private life.

LJ softball: Q&A with co-captains Kaitlin Murphy and Roxy Metcalf

3B Kaitlin Murphy, before the Vikings'

game at Mission Bay April 18.

(Photos by Ed Piper)

By Ed Piper

Kaitlin Murphy and Roxy Metcalf are co-captains of the Viking softball team. They spoke before La Jolla's game at Mission Bay Thurs., April 18. Murphy, a senior, starts at third base. Metcalf, a junior, holds down shortstop.

How's it been going lately? What are you guys working on? (to Kaitlin)

We're just working on getting on our pitching back to win some more games.

What are some strengths of your team?

J.C. (Taylor) and Aviv (Laska) have been hitting really well.

How about yourself?

I've been hitting decently. So has Roxy.

How's your play at third? Solid?

Yeah, we've been doing good defense-wise. I think I'm doing pretty well.

What types of things do you do as leadership as a four-year varsity member?

Roxy and I are captains, so we help the team out that way.

Roxy Metcalf

(To Roxy) Leadership--what do you try to instill in these young players?

Honestly, hard work and commitment. I think commitment is a big problem that we had on our team in the past. So making sure everyone shows up and that they're ready to play when they show up is what we've been trying to do this season.

You're a junior. You're in your third year on varsity. What have you seen during your years?

I've seen ups and downs of our team. Definitely, pitching is something we need to work on. Every year there's a lot of new girls, but this year a lot of the same people have come back. So, honestly, (it's) reworking those same skills to get the team back to where we were in the past. 

You guys have been good at talking to people who haven't played before, or who weren't going to go out for the high school team. How's that work?

We've definitely lost a lot of people, but this year we've gained a lot of experienced girls. We have a JV team, and a lot of the freshmen have played before. J.C. and Savannah (Putnam) are sophomores and have come back from last year, and they've just been very helpful.

LJ baseball @ Coronado 4/19

Photos by Ed Piper

1B Ryan Kestler hit by pitch T1

View of Hotel Del

LJ softball @ Mission Bay 4/18

Photos by Ed Piper

LJ track @ SDHS w/Canyon Hills - tri-meet 4/18

Photos by Ed Piper

Junior Olivia Smith (R) hands the baton

to senior Sienna Gustafson (L) in the

girls 4x100-meter relay. Smith ran the

second leg, Gustafson the third.

Anastasia Volkov went 17'0"

in the long jump,

a personal record.

Avery Redfern (center, red LJ jersey) ran second

in the 100-meter hurdles in 17.64 behind

SDHS's Anisa Bowen-Fontenot (right)

in 14.24.

Anastasia Volkov clears a height in the long jump.

She reached 4'10" in the meet. Avery Redfern

won the event at 5'2", a personal record.

Rush-hour commute on the Coronado Bridge

out of Coronado at 5 p.m., as seen

from SDHS.

Luke Daly

'A slice of heaven'

"STEM Day" at the park, with thousands of

elementary students in attendance for a 12 noon

game. I went to my first game at age 8

in 1962, the first year Dodger Stadium

was open.

(Photo by Ed Piper)

By Ed Piper

(Disclaimer: If you're not a Dodgers fan, read no further. Go to other blog entries.)

It was a slice of heaven, a day at Dodger Stadium that was two years in the making (following health issues, etc.)

L.A. got their stuff handed to them, but the facility continues to be one of the highlights of the major leagues, with all the remodeling and displays that surround the stadium. I missed the Jackie Robinson statue, which I've seen before but which has been moved. There was just too much going on in the hubbub of finding handicapped parking, getting into the park, and getting situated.

The upper deck, where we sat, has beautiful displays of yearly All-Stars at each position--imagine the rich history of the franchise in Brooklyn and Los Angeles to have enough players to fill out that kind of lineup.

And the present edition of the team is so star-studded (but playing poorly right now, as happens in baseball--winning five, losing seven of their last dozen games), that you kind of gasp to realize the names that are running out their positions everyday (or positioning for the DH spot, in the case of Shohei Ohtani). Mookie Betts, moved from right field to second base, now to shortstop, is excelling and sailing forward in his gaudy start to the 2024 season.

Freddie Freeman, the other superstar in the Dodgers' 1-2-3 spots in the batting order behind Betts and Ohtani, is slumping right now. But he is a .330 hitter for his career, so in the course of the 162-game baseball season, this is a slight blip for him.

All in all, a wonderful day. A 12:10 p.m. game, which made it all possible to get up to L.A., leaving in the morning. Then enjoying the full game, then three-hour return drive to land back at the pad by 6:15 p.m. A full day. A good day.

LJ b golf vs. Scripps Ranch @ Torrey Pines Golf Course - 4/16

Viking golfers (most in red shirts) group together

on the practice putting green at Torrey Pines

Golf Course right before first tee at 4:12 p.m.

Tues., April 16 versus Scripps Ranch.

(Photo by Ed Piper)

By Ed Piper

It's always a hot topic for discussion, but this time Carson Diehl, younger brother of Jackson, star quarterback for La Jolla High's football team, was talking about a tournament in Dallas.

"Carson, have you ever had your hands measured?" asked a reporter, following up on a conversation they had a couple of weeks ago about Diehl's uncanny ability to snag interceptions on the football field. (He was named All-CIF primarily as a sophomore primarily because he led the county in interceptions with nine in Fall 2023.)

"No," replied Carson, "but I had my arm measured. This was at a tournament in Dallas."

He went on to say that his right arm--demonstrating by stretching his arm out to the side--was measured as "31"--inches in length from the shoulder.

Why at the tournament in Dallas?

That's where SMU is, one of the colleges Jackson, unrecruited despite a phenomenal senior season as a two-way threat (running and passing), is considering walking on as a non-scholarship player and trying out for the team.

"They didn't offer him much money," said Carson of SMU's non-athletic package. "It costs a lot to go to SMU, and they only offered him" (blank dollars--he gave an amount).

"If he doesn't get more, he'll probably go to U(niversity) of A(rizona) or Utah."

This was all on the practice putting green at Torrey Pines Golf Course before the Vikings' league match against Scripps Ranch Tues., April 16. First tee was scheduled at 4:12 p.m.

LJ badminton vs. Scripps Ranch - 4/16

Photos by Ed Piper

LJ girls singles #1 Tamika Hsieh

returns a shot in her match.

Lefty Emily Upatham, second singles,

prepares to serve against

Scripps' Yumi Nguyen.

LJ g lax 6, Cathedral 13 - 4th quarter 4/15

Photos by Ed Piper