Baseball Players

Katella High School first baseman/outfielder Kyle Evans, El Dorado catcher Brian Loyd and San Diego Vista shortstop Aaron Rounsifer have made oral commitments to play baseball at Cal State Fullerton. They said they will sign national letters of intent this week. Evans, an All-Empire League selection last season, entered the week batting .341 with five home runs, 13 runs batted in and 11 runs scored.

Cal State Fullerton has signed 12 baseball players, five of them pitchers, to national letters to play beginning in the 1998 season. The pitchers signed include right-handers Jordan DeJong of El Dorado High, Kirk Saarloos of Cerritos Valley Christian and Jason Westemeir of Mission Hills Alemany. The two left-handers are George Carralejo of Kennedy High and Jon Smith of Perris High.

Young sluggers from San Juan Capistrano and Mission Viejo literally will sweat it out over the next two weeks as the group of 11- and 12-year-old baseball players prepare to depart Aug. 6 for the steamy South Pacific and Far East. According to Bob Noel, the manager and organizer of the 15-member all-star team that will spend 10 days in the Philippines and Hong Kong, the players are practicing in sweat suits with light jackets under their shirts to get ready for the tropical heat.

Let's get this straight. The Oakland Athletics' Rickey Henderson thinks he is underpaid at $3 million per season and wants his contract renegotiated. Pittsburgh Pirate outfielder Barry Bonds, who lost his arbitration case and will receive only $2.3 million in 1991, was last seen exchanging scowls and words with his manager, Jim Leyland. Perhaps they should be made aware of the saga of Frank (Lefty) O'Doul, an outfielder for the Brooklyn Dodgers in the 1930s.

Talk about things you never thought you'd hear yourself say: I'm glad I'm not a major-league baseball player. When I was a kid, I'd have sold my parents to the circus if someone had promised me a career as a big-leaguer. I'd have thrown in my sisters too. Now, no thanks. Being a major leaguer in 1995 may prove more headache-inducing than a Roger Clemens fastball to the noggin. For starters, I'm not sure I could--with a straight face--picket a job site that paid me $1 million a year.

Gloves, bats and balls were not part of a special practice session last week for Crespi High baseball players Mike Peters, Joe Ruggiero and Mark Venturine. Instead, the outfielders sported shorts and track spikes during a lunchtime session spent rehearsing starts and handoffs with sprinter Ken Kuras. The hastily assembled 440-yard relay team shocked track Coach Jim Benkert, who had arranged the practice, with a respectable 45.2-second clocking despite two technical errors.

Faced with defections and complaints over the quality of local baseball, a Cuban official said Thursday that the country won't let any more players work abroad. "There will not be more Cuban baseball players in foreign leagues for the moment," Carlos Rodriguez, national director of baseball, told the Cuban government's Prensa Latina news agency, monitored in Mexico City.

There was a game in Port St. Lucie between the Mets and the Yankees and, in almost any spring except this one, there would have been no better sports place in the world than Thomas J. White Stadium, right off the exit from I-95. Maybe Jimmy Key would have pitched against Bret Saberhagen.

Cal State Northridge, which was victimized by former Valley-area baseball players Mike Hankins of Simi Valley High and Charlie Fiacco of Camarillo in Wednesday's 13-8 loss to UCLA, will try to avoid a similar occurrence when USC visits Matador field Saturday.

Shawn Holcomb's preparation for his senior season on El Dorado High School's baseball team gave no indication of the type of year he was about to experience. He didn't play organized baseball last summer, opting to spend time with his father, who lives in Turlock, Calif. Holcomb lifted weights every other day at the local high school. He didn't play a full season of winter baseball, pitching in only two games for a Toronto Blue Jays scout team after experiencing pain in his right elbow.