The BulleTin • Sunday, June 27, 2021 B3
COLLEGE BASEBALL
Oregon State’s young nucleus is ‘ready to take next step’
BY JOE FREEMAN
The Oregonian
As Mitch Canham gathered
the 2021 Oregon State baseball
team for one last chat, he gazed
around at the departing lead-
ers — the Kevin Abels, Andy
Armstrongs, Troy Claunches
and Jake Mulhollands — for an
emotional farewell.
The Beavers had just en-
dured a crushing 8-5 defeat to
Dallas Baptist in the NCAA
Regionals and the pain and dis-
appointing were raw. A team
with College World Series as-
pirations had squandered a
five-run lead, and the careers
of several prominent Beavers
ended in heartbreak.
Canham thanked them, em-
pathized with their pain and
told them he loved them.
“They fought the good fight,”
he said. “They’re special and we
respect the heck out of them for
everything that they’ve done
and, as an alumni myself, we
look up to him.”
Then the OSU coach shifted
his eyes to his young, returning
players and issued a challenge.
Remember this moment — and
this regional experience — he
said. Use it as fuel for the future.
Blazers
Continued from B1
The Celtics hired Udoka.
Portland is stuck with Ol-
shey, who now looks woefully
unaware of his franchise’s own
history.
It wasn’t that long ago that
Paul Allen’s organization em-
barrassed itself with dog fight-
ing, drag racing and other law-
breaking. The Blazers had a
registered sex offender playing
small forward, remember? In
the end, fans stopped showing
up to the arena and sponsors
“Mitch kind of got us fired
up,” sophomore Matthew Gret-
ler said.
When seasons end, the ten-
dency is to focus on the past.
But as the Beavers move be-
yond the most unique two-year
stretch in program history,
their focus is on what’s ahead.
The backbone of the team is
expected to leave, as the Bea-
vers’ ace right-hander (Abel),
starting catcher (Claunch),
starting shortstop (Armstrong),
closer (Mulholland) and best
power hitter (Ryan Ober) will
join a handful of others who
have either exhausted their eli-
gibility or plan to depart in the
Major League Baseball draft.
But the Beavers’ roster is lit-
tered with young talent. Pro-
gram insiders are bullish on the
Beavers’ future.
“I love the younger guys,”
Canham said. “They’re ready to
take the next step and I’m ex-
cited to see where they take the
program.”
The pitching staff will not
only have to replace Abel and
Mulholland, but also Jack
Washburn and Mitchell Ver-
burg. Washburn has entered
the transfer portal and Verburg
boycotted. Those things — and
not a conscience — forced the
basketball organization to shift
organizational philosophy.
Allen vowed that character
would matter, going forward.
Then, his beloved basketball
franchise got about drafting
and hiring people this city
found easy to root for. Paul’s
gone now.
A question: Does character
still matter?
Not if you’re hiring Billups
to replace Terry Stotts. That
move sends a terrible message,
particularly to the women in
“I love the younger guys. They’re ready to take the next step
and I’m excited to see where they take the program.”
— Mitch Canham, Oregon State baseball coach
is expected to move on to pro-
fessional baseball.
But Cooper Hjerpe and Jake
Pfennigs will return to anchor
the starting rotation and Will
Frisch, who made six starts and
excelled in a variety of roles,
could be in line to join them as
the Sunday starter. The Beavers’
bullpen limped to the finish
line, combining to finish 2-5 in
May. But, on the whole, it was
one of the best in the Pac-12
Conference, and will return all
but three pieces, including Bry-
ant Salgado, Joey Mundt, Brock
Townsend and Chase Watkins.
The lineup will lose two
heart-and-soul pieces in Arm-
strong and Claunch. But Can-
ham started six freshmen/
sophomores in the regional, as
talented up-and-comers Kyle
Dernedde, Justin Boyd, Wade
Meckler, Garret Forrester, Greg
Fuchs and Gretler carried the
offense.
Dernedde, the postseason
star who played shortstop at
Tualatin High School, is the
leading contender to replace
Armstrong at shortstop, while
Cole Hamilton, who batted
.318 as a backup before suffer-
ing an April injury, is in line to
replace Claunch.
The Beavers’ offense will
receive its biggest boost from
the return of Jacob Melton,
who emerged as the team’s best
hitter before suffering a sea-
son-ending shoulder injury in
late April.
An offense anchored by
Meckler, Melton and post-
season heroes Forrester and
Dernedde should be better and
more consistent.
“It was great to see Meckler
come into his own,” Canham
said. “He and Melton are two
our state. Never mind that Bil-
lups worked as an assistant
with the Clippers. Never mind
that he and Olshey go way
back. Portland isn’t L.A. The
hire of Billups feels all wrong.
Sex-assault survivor Brenda
Tracy is in disbelief today.
Maybe you will be, too, after
you read the details of the trou-
bling allegations pointed at Bil-
lups and a couple of his team-
mates in November of 1997.
A night out at a comedy club
ended with a woman calling
police and getting a rape kit
at the hospital. The exam re-
vealed “injuries to her throat,
cervix, and rectum, along with
bruising on her back consistent
with someone being dragged
across a rug.”
Billups initially told investi-
gators his role was consensual.
The NBA star claimed at first
that he wasn’t even present in
the teammate’s condominium
where the alleged assault took
place.
That teammate, Antoine
Walker, eventually filed a now-
sealed lawsuit against Billups.
He was never charged with a
crime. Billups eventually set-
tled the case out of court in
2000 for an undisclosed sum.
Said Tracy: “Guess I won’t
be going to any Blazer games.
I’m glad the men who raped
me didn’t amount to much be-
cause I can’t imagine how hard
it is to watch your rapist suc-
ceed in life when you’re trying
to deal with the fallout.”
I’ve already heard from Blaz-
ers fans who say they won’t
bring themselves to support
the franchise if Billups is offi-
cially hired. One of them said
his wife was raped and he won’t
put her through the trauma
Courtesy Mario Terrana
Oregon State’s Kyle Dernedde rips a bases-clearing double against Mc-
Neese State in an elimination game in the Fort Worth Regional on Sat-
urday in Fort Worth, Texas. Dernedde, a freshman this year, made the
most of his opportunities late in the season.
Slater
MLB
Continued from B1
Continued from B1
“It’s going to be up to him
to decide but he is going to
be really susceptible to injury
again,” Slater said of his friend
and protégé.
It seemed Slater’s Olympic
hopes had been settled in a
semifinal in December 2019
at the famed Pipeline on the
North Shore, regarded as surf-
ing’s ultimate playground.
Slater needed to defeat Bra-
zilian star Italo Ferreira in
the Pipe Masters heat to pass
Florence, who had compiled
enough points despite with-
drawing from the world tour
after an anterior cruciate liga-
ment tear.
“I literally missed making
the Olympics by one wave, by
one heat,” Slater said. “If I had
won one more heat from the
whole year I would have made
the team.”
Greg Cruse, chief executive
of USA Surfing, expects An-
dino to be ready for Tokyo. So
it comes down to Florence and
Slater again but without waves
determining the outcome.
Cruse is confident Florence
will be honest about his capa-
bility.
“John John at 70% could
still medal,” Cruse said. “I want
him to make the best decision
for him.”
Spin rates may be down a
bit but little else seems to have
changed other than the side
show that unfolds every time
an umpire approaches a pitcher
to make sure nothing is being
hidden.
Hitters are still swinging and
missing. And, so far at least, no
one has been decapitated by a
pitch that got away.
Apparently the old standby
of sweat and rosin works pretty
well, too. Either that or pitchers
have found a way to apply the
sticky stuff and still manage to
avoid detection.
Whatever, the crackdown
on sticky substances isn’t the
game changer pitchers claimed
it would be — or, it seems, the
quick fix Manfred was after.
Conversely, it also doesn’t
seem to be doing much to make
the game any more watch-
able, though Manfred quickly
claimed credit for what he said
were positive trends in the ana-
lytics department.
But do give the commis-
sioner credit for doing some-
thing — anything, really — to
save a game that is in undeni-
able decline.
Lost in the theatrics — and
semi-hysterics — over the
shakedown pitchers must now
endure is a simple calculation
about major league baseball
that has become apparent as the
midpoint of the season nears.
Fewer things are happening
in baseball games. And it’s tak-
ing them longer to happen.
That’s a losing recipe for any
sport fighting for the eyeballs in
today’s fractured media world.
But for baseball it’s becoming
a crisis that threatens the game
itself.
The newly implemented en-
forcement of the ban on sticky
stuff on baseballs won’t sud-
denly make things more in-
teresting. MLB has let things
go for too long to get the game
back in one fell swoop.
But it just might prompt
other changes to save the game
we all love.
Manfred seems to under-
stand that, even if he has pre-
sided over a degradation of
baseball that began in earnest
on Bud Selig’s watch. America’s
national pastime is on its way
to becoming a niche sport, and
those running it ignore the slide
Erik Kabik Photography/MediaPunch/IPX via AP, file photos
Kelly Slater gets barreled at the 50th Annual Billabong Pipe Masters in Haleiwa, Hawaii, in December.
The meet in Japan would be
the first competition in months
for both U.S. Olympians if they
are healthy enough to surf.
Cruse said the final rosters
have to be submitted by July
24.
Slater also has been injured
this year with ankle and hip is-
sues. He has competed in only
two of six WSL Championship
Tour events so far.
Kelly Slater at Pipe Masters in December.
“I literally missed making the Olympics by one wave, by
one heat. If I had won one more heat from the whole year
I would have made the team.”
— Kelly Slater
But he looked good in his
first competition since the in-
juries when finishing eighth
over the weekend. Slater didn’t
take any practice runs at the
artificial wave pool he devel-
oped in the Central Valley.
Instead, the surfer arrived 20
minutes before his first heat,
advanced to the next round
and then spent a day doing
promotional work and hang-
ing with friends.
“I hope he decides to come
to Japan just in case John
John can’t surf,” USA Surfing’s
Cruse said. “He needs to be
there and be recognized.”
The WSL’s chief executive
Erik Logan said having Slater
at the first surfing Olympics
would be a fitting tribute “for
us to sit back and enjoy the ca-
reer that he’s had and the fact
that he is in the top five in the
sport today at his age.”
Slater is the caretaker of
professional surfing, having
ushered the sport into the
21st century as its popular-
ity exploded. The Olympics
provides the sport with a big
stage beyond the ocean, which
causes Slater some concern.
“Surfing has gotten more
mainstream but there is an im-
portance in keeping the DNA
on the right side,” he said of
the counterculture lifestyle.
Slater proposed building a
wave system in Japan for the
Olympics to ensure a good
showing. But he said Tokyo
organizers wanted to use their
beaches instead of an artifi-
cially produced wave.
That leaves the surfing
competition at the mercy of
weather gods.
Another issue is the com-
petitive field. Each country
was allotted two Olympic
spots, which is standard for
many sports. The problem is
most of the world’s best surfers
hail from Australia, Brazil and
the United States.
If he winds up competing,
Slater isn’t interested in win-
ning medals for his country as
much as meeting athletes to
share cultures. It is something
he has done for 35 years while
on an endless summer.
“I’m from Florida but I don’t
necessarily feel like an Amer-
ican,” Slater said. “I feel like I
came from the Earth.”
From the ocean is more
like it.
peas in a pod. They can sit in
the cage and hit for hours. That
will be contagious.”
The program always has fea-
tured plenty of talent. It’s typ-
ically the intangibles that sep-
arate the good teams from the
great teams.
Canham repeatedly touted
his team’s chemistry and cohe-
sion this season, but enhanced
safety measures related to the
coronavirus pandemic cre-
ated more isolation than ever
and eliminated chances for
team-building exercises.
Canham will make it a prior-
ity to bring next year’s team to-
gether in ways that were impos-
sible during the pandemic.
“One of the biggest things
for me is always the culture,”
Canham said. “And we had
lots of obstacles with that this
year. Being as close as we were
and accomplishing what we
did with all the limitations was
remarkable. I’m excited about
what’s ahead.”
of bringing her to games. An-
other offered that it’s just too
sobering to absorb.
Billups might win some
games. He might even win over
some fans. But at what cost?
This is a franchise that
promised us we’d be proud
of the employees it brought
to town. I’m not sure anyone
closely following this hire feels
proud.
I doubt Olshey will spend
a minute considering how
far back he’s setting the fran-
chise by hiring Billups. But he
should.
Sam Hodde/AP
Home plate umpire Dan Ias-
sogna, right, inspects the glove
of Texas Rangers starting pitcher
Kyle Gibson (44) Monday in Ar-
lington, Texas.
in popularity at their own risk.
That there are more strike-
outs than hits is only one part of
a bigger problem. Baseball has
turned into a home run derby,
with pitchers throwing as hard
as they can, hitters swinging
even harder, and little else hap-
pening otherwise.
Meanwhile, those who love
the game for its strategy and
nuances have watched, baffled
that it could go this far.
That Manfred decided his
first line of attack will be against
cheaters who load up base-
balls with sticky substances is,
of course, loaded with irony.
This is the same commissioner
who refused to punish Houston
players after they cheated their
way to a World Series title in
2017, and he follows a commis-
sioner who did little about ste-
roid cheaters who helped get us
where we are today.
But this is more about try-
ing to correct an imbalance in
the game than it is to ferret out
cheaters. It’s doing something
proactive to boost baseball
other than simply trotting out
some hideous new All-Star uni-
forms.
It’s also sending a message
in advance of talks on a new
collective bargaining agree-
ment with players this postsea-
son that if they don’t agree to
changes in the game, the com-
missioner has the power to do
some things on his own.
The bottom line is baseball
has been trending in the wrong
direction for a long time now.
And even a small step toward
reversing that beats doing noth-
ing at all.