The UCLA baseball team’s sluggish bats will need to wake up if the Bruins are to repeat last year’s victory in the Dodgertown Classic
Junior Dean Espy and the UCLA baseball team are looking to get out of a hitting funk this weekend at the second annual Dodgertown Classic.
By Daily Bruin Staff
March 10, 2011 2:07 a.m.
If the UCLA baseball team was hoping that a change in venue would cure its hitting woes, it won’t get any help this weekend.
Not even Major League Baseball hitters find great success at Dodger Stadium. The Los Angeles Dodgers themselves hit just .258 at their home venue, traditionally thought of as a pitcher’s ballpark, a season ago.
The No. 13 Bruins (7-4) will take part in the second annual Dodgertown Classic, a three-game round-robin series held Friday through Sunday. Southeastern Conference foe Georgia (4-8) and St. Mary’s (3-6) of the West Coast Conference will visit Jackie Robinson Stadium and USC’s (3-9) Dedeaux Field on Friday and Saturday. Sunday will pit the two visitors as well as the two hometown teams against each other at Dodger Stadium.
UCLA is hitting just .241 so far this season, the ninth-worst average in the Pac-10, and was able to manufacture only six runs in its latest road series loss to Nebraska.
“We didn’t swing the bats like we’re capable of, and we’ve got to go back to the drawing board and find a way to score runs,” UCLA coach John Savage said after his team lost 5-4 to Nebraska in 11 innings Sunday.
Any number of factors could be to blame for the Bruins’ lack of offensive output. There are new faces in the batting order, and the NCAA implemented new, less powerful bats this season to even the playing field. Maybe the Bruins feel pressure to live up to their teammates on the mound, who tout an astonishing 1.55 ERA, No. 1 in the Pac-10.
According to junior infielder Dean Espy, it’s too early to start jumping to conclusions.
“Everyone’s trying to do too much,” Espy said. “We are a good team and we will hit but, early on, there’s too much trying to force things instead of just letting things come to us.”
“We’re taking a lot of individual at-bats instead of team at-bats. Once we get into a flow where we’re focused on getting the next guy to the plate and doing the small things right, it will start flowing for us.”
Sunday’s return to Dodger Stadium should bring back some fond memories for the Bruins after they walked away with a 6-1 victory against the Trojans in the inaugural Classic last season.
That game saw nearly 15,000 fans in attendance, a number that was much higher than officials anticipated; more seating had to be opened up, and the concessions stands ran out of hot dogs.
“It was such a great atmosphere,” Espy said of last year’s game. “I vividly remember looking up and seeing the red and blue divided. It was really cool and it’s a really good environment to play in, and we feed off of that energy.”
