Over the course of consecutive games against the Anchorage Bucs, Athletes in Action second baseman Eric Rodland banged out seven straight base hits, which left Bucs manager Jim Yanko scratching his head.
"I remember looking at my lineup card and then the card from the day before, and thinking, 'God, can we get this guy out?' " Yanko said.
There was a lot of that going around the Alaska Baseball League this summer.
Rodland scorched pitchers for a .423 average, 87 points higher than anyone else in the league. That excellence earned him the Player of the Year award on the All-Alaska Team, as voted by media and scorekeepers who regularly covered the six-team, wood-bat league.
Rodland, 22, who will be entering his senior season at Gonzaga University, was also a unanimous All-Alaska pick at second base. He led the ABL with 71 hits, tied for the league lead in triples (5), finished second in stolen bases (20) and third in runs scored (25).
The 6-foot-1, 180-pounder, who is pursuing a mechanical engineering degree and is getting married in two weeks, was so consistent his 0 for 8 performance last week in a 17-inning, 2-1 win over the Anchorage Glacier Pilots pretty much constituted his summer slump.
"It's been a blast," Rodland said. "I started swinging well right off the bat and that got my confidence way up."
AIA manager J.D. Arndt said Rodland mesmerized him with his command of the strike zone and his bat control. Rare was the time Rodland swung at a bad pitch. Yanko said he was impressed by Rodland's ability to foul off two-strike pitches and wait for a pitch more to his liking. And in a season when far too many players made something as relatively simple as putting down a sacrifice bunt look like the impossible dream, Rodland could drop down a bunt any time.
"The thing that kills me -- and I've been a hitting coach for 10 years -- is I've never seen the plate discipline of an Eric Rodland," Arndt said.
The only other unanimous selection on the All-Alaska team was Anchorage Bucs pitcher Jered Weaver, a lanky, languid right-hander who through Tuesday was 4-1 with a 1.25 earned run average and 61 strikeouts in 572/3 innings.
The 6-foot-5 Weaver, whose older brother Jeff pitches for the New York Yankees, reminds Yanko of Jeff Francis. Francis, a left-hander who was the Player of the Year as a Buc last season, was a first-round selection of the Colorado Rockies in the Major League Baseball draft earlier this summer.
"He was, in my mind, just as dominant as Francis was last year, just from the right side," Yanko said. "He was the same with his competitiveness, his work ethic, his makeup and his velocity."
Weaver consistently threw all four of his pitches -- fastball, curve, slider and changeup -- for strikes. He walked just 19.
"He's got a great upside -- great size, great bloodlines," Yanko said. "A lot of people I know -- his father, scouts -- say he's farther along at this point than Jeff was."
Weaver is a different, and interesting, cat. Before every inning, he turns his back to the plate, walks to the grass between the mound and second base, and goes through a routine. He bends over and stretches his hamstrings, then alternately kicks his left leg and right leg behind him to loosen them. Then he turns around, slowly strides to the back of the mound, bends over and uses his right index finger to write the initials of his late grandparents in the dirt.
The Fairbanks Goldpanners, who shared the ABL championship with the Anchorage Glacier Pilots, placed four players on the 16-player All-Alaska Team, as did the Bucs. Three Glacier Pilots and three AIA players made the squad, and two Peninsula Oilers were selected. The last-
place Mat-Su Miners did not have a player make the team.
Panners manager Ed Cheff, who has won 12 NAIA national championships and three of the last four at Lewis-Clark State College in Idaho, was voted Coach of the Year.
The Panners have the youngest and oldest players on the All-Alaska team. Outfielder Scott Robinson, 18, is straight out of high school, and right-handed pitcher Sean Timmons, 27, a Fairbanks native, is headed to graduate school in the fall.
Robinson, a seventh-round draft pick of the Houston Astros who hopes to sign with them, hit a team-high .336, led the state with 27 RBIs and struck out just eight times in 149 at bats. His performance was reminiscent of Philadelphia Phillies first baseman Travis Lee, who in 1993 came straight out of high school to play for the Panners, hit .365 with a wood bat and was a unanimous All-Alaska pick.
"It's pretty awesome to be able to hang in with guys who are juniors in college and older than me," said Robinson, a left-handed hitter who as an ambidextrous high schooler in San Diego played first base left-handed and catcher right-handed.
Robinson's father, Bruce, played catcher for the Panners in the early 70s and advanced to the major leagues. On a family vacation half his lifetime ago, 9-year-old Scott was inserted as a pinch runner by the Panners in an exhibition game. As he laughingly tells it now, he was nearly decapitated by a line drive struck by Panners outfielder Jose Cruz Jr., now with the Toronto Blue Jays.
"He hit a rod about three feet over my head," Robinson said.
Timmons, who has played six seasons for the Panners, went 6-0 with a 1.84 ERA, 45 strikeouts and just nine walks in 582/3 innings.
The rest of the All-Alaska pitching staff was no less dominating.
Glacier Pilots hulking left-hander David Purcey (6-5, 235) went 2-1 with one save and a 1.08 ERA and struck out 68 in 50 innings. Opponents hit a mere .133 against him and just .116 with runners in scoring position.
Glacier Pilots slight right-hander Sean Warlop (5-8 and maybe 150 after supersizing his dinner) proved size doesn't always matter. He went 4-1 with a 1.32 ERA in 611/3 innings. In a combined 1101/3 innings, Purcey and Warlop did not surrender a home run.
AIA right-hander Derek Roper went 5-2 with one save and a 0.87 ERA, and pitched two shutouts. Panners relief pitcher Zak Basch went 4-1 with two saves, a 0.76 ERA and 33 strikeouts in 351/3 innings.
Joining Robinson in the All-Alaska outfield is Bucs speed merchant Terry Trofholz, who hit a team-high .336, did not commit an error and, by Yanko's estimate, beat out five or six intended sacrifice bunts for base hits. Rounding out the outfield is Tony Perez of the Panners, who hit .263, scored a team-high 31 runs and did not commit an error.
Glacier Pilots slugger Dennis Bigley, who hit a league-leading eight home runs and drove in 24 runs, is the All-Alaska designated hitter. The All-Alaska utility players is Joe Diefenderfer of the Bucs, who hit .283, drew 25 walks, drove in 17 runs and made seven pitching appearances.
Bucs catcher Sean Flynn earned All-Alaska status by hitting .273, catching nearly every game and committing just one error. Oilers first baseman Andy Schutzenhofer hit .302 with 13 doubles, 28 runs, 24 RBIs, 43 walks in 49 games and a mere six strikeouts in about 200 plate appearances.
Oilers shortstop Preston Griffin hit .306 with 10 doubles and 22 RBIs. And AIA third baseman Tim Petru made up for his .209 average with five homers and 23 RBIs in a summer when third base was arguably the weakest position in the ABL.
Assistant sports editor Doyle Woody can be reached at dwoody@adn.com.
