By Jeff Agase
Daily Bruin Staff
If Matlock moonlighted as a baseball manager, he’d sound a
lot like UCLA head coach Gary Adams.
Following a bizarre rule foul-up by Cal State Fullerton head
coach George Horton, it’d be easy to dismiss Adams’
delay of the game and official protest of the Bruins’ 9-7
loss as nothing more than petty lawyerball. That is, until you hear
his unfailingly convincing argument and almost disturbing knowledge
of even the most obscure of baseball rules.
It’s the bottom of the eighth. Fullerton pitcher Sean
Martin is replaced by Chad Cordero, who, instead of exiting the
game, moves to second base.
According to the rules … well, let’s let Gary Adams,
Esquire, take over, pro bono.
“The pitcher who is moving to another position has to go
in the lineup in the place of the defensive spot he takes over,
meaning Martin has to hit in the second baseman’s
spot,” Adams began. “But he didn’t, he hit at the
DH spot, when the pitcher who came in (Cordero) is supposed to hit
in the DH spot.
“(Horton) has to say about any switches in the order, and
then the umpires are supposed to say no, but they didn’t. So
we let Martin hit in the ninth, because if you protest prior to his
at-bat, the other coach will just say “˜Thanks, Gary’
and change the lineup back.”
Adams’ argument fell on deaf ears, as he was probably the
only person at Jackie Robinson Stadium, possibly the only person in
America, who knew of the rule. Horton said he didn’t know the
rule and asked for clarification from the first-base umpire, and
Adams said he saw no malicious intent on Horton’s part.
But Martin’s sacrifice bunt led to two Fullerton runs in
the top of the ninth and the Bruins lost by two runs, their leader
apparently defeated in his closing argument.
That is, until Adams learned that the umpires admitted they were
wrong about the rule and that his protest, according to one of the
umpires, has a good chance of being the first one ever won by a
coach in Southern California.
It appears as though Adams has convinced even the most skeptical
of juries that his case is legitimate. About an hour after the
game, he said that should the protest go through, the game will
begin again prior to the teams’ meeting next month at
Fullerton, starting with the bunt at-bat and the Bruins down by
only one run.
In a mere 30 minutes, he went from being alone in his righteous
quest for justice to a position to make history.
He knew it all along. The evidence was overwhelming.