Way to Go Awards 2009

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Where Are They Now - Brett Hayes, Florida Marlins

Catching On
By Steve Hunt

Looking around Major League Baseball, it’s not hard to see a number of Nevada products in “the show”. One former Wolf Packer who aspires to add his name to that list is Brett Hayes. This spring, he went to big-league camp on Florida’s 40-man roster, the same team that drafted him in the second round of the June 2005 draft.

Like many who have played there, his success dates back to his days in Reno. “It was a great experience,” he said. “I remember going in there, fighting for a job and somewhere to play, whether it be outfield or infield. Catching wasn’t even my main focus. I was just going in there to play some outfield. It just so happened that they needed a catcher and I popped in there. I guess you can say five, six years later, here I am.”

The California native remembers his first exposure to Wolf Pack baseball when he was in high school. “In L.A., I played for an American Legion team and the coach was good friends with Gary Powers and his staff,” Hayes said.

“We were in a tournament in Reno and I just loved the facilities. It was far enough away from home that I was away from everyone but close enough that I could still go home. Everyone was very friendly and I loved the atmosphere.”

In three seasons at Nevada, Hayes developed into a solid backstop. However, a thumb injury nearly derailed his hopes of being drafted.

“I was very happy (when Florida picked me),” he said. “That day was very nerve racking because the third to the last game of my senior year, I broke my thumb. So I didn’t know if I was going to get drafted or not based on that. Hearing my name called was definitely a relief and I was ready for the opportunity.”

So in the summer of ’05, he was sent to the Gulf Coast League to begin his pro career.

“When I got drafted, I came down here to rehab my thumb and just sat around watching everyone else play,” Hayes recalled. “That was a little frustrating because that was the first time I had ever really been hurt. The biggest adjustment was getting ready to play every day because in college, you would play three days a week or maybe four. You just had to maintain your body and get ready to play on a daily basis.”

Unlike many other catchers, Hayes already had considerable experience calling his own pitches, something almost unheard of at the high school and collegiate levels.

“At Nevada, I was very fortunate to be able to call my own pitches ever since I was a freshman,” he said. “I hadn’t seen that at all at the college level. People had the wristbands and everyone else was calling pitches but the catcher, but I was able to do that early. In pro ball, there are tendencies and you set people up. The wooden bat is a lot different from the metal bat and there are a lot more hits in college, but it’s definitely a mind game when it comes to calling pitches up here.”

While going from swinging a metal bat to a wooden one wasn’t a big transition, the switch paid unexpected dividends behind the plate.

“I think it made my pitch calling better because a jam shot wasn’t a home run, it was an out,” Hayes said. “That was a good adjustment. Hitting, I always used to take BP with wood in college and high school. So I was very familiar with it and it carried over pretty well for me.”

During Spring Training, he was savoring his first experience as a roster player with the Marlins.

“I know the pitchers here, have played with them, have caught them and have gained more playing time,” he said. “You’ve got to get to know your teammates. In the last few years when I wasn’t on the roster, I helped out in the bullpen and things like that. I knew my role and enjoyed it, but this year, I knew that coming here, I had a job to do.”

Hayes wouldn’t trade his gig for anything in the world, but he does feel that the average fan has a misguided view about the true life of a ball player.

“They still think that we just show up and play at seven o’clock,” he said. “But we’re there at noon every day doing work people don’t see. We put a lot of effort and hard work into getting out on that field at seven o’clock and those outcomes. It’s all that stuff behind the scenes that they don’t see like the cage work, bullpen throwing and all that stuff that turns into the success on the field that the fans don’t see.”

Nevada Boxing 2009

Seeing the Bigger Picture
By Steve Hunt

Many athletes at the University of Nevada compete under scholarship. The ultimate goal for many of these competitors is to do so at the highest level, in the professional ranks. So it makes sense that the top revenue sports like football and men’s basketball get the lion’s share of publicity. However, there are a number of club sports whose athletes do not receive scholarships that still garner their share of attention, one of which is boxing.

In fact, the spotlight was on the Nevada boxing team in mid-February when Joey Gilbert, a product of the program, fought Jesse Brinkley in a much-anticipated grudge match in Reno on February 14. “Greg Rice and I coached him for your years,” Nevada boxing head coach Mike Martino said. “His first year in 1996, he made the national championships but suffered a broken nose in a regional tournament and we had to stop the fight here in Reno in the quarterfinals. So he did not get to fight for the championship. He then came back and won three titles.”

While he is proud of what Gilbert has accomplished as a professional, Martino admits that is not the purpose of his program. “It’s never been my goal for these young men to lace up the gloves after college,” he said. “My interest has always been that they get their degree, go out and become successful representatives of our program in the community as businessmen in whatever career or profession they take up.”

“It’s unique that somebody from college boxing has advanced to his level in professional boxing,” Martino said. “Greg Rice and I talk about it every once in a while. I don’t know if we take pride in it. We know that he’s a good young man who will be successful in whatever he does and we support that. It’s a unique relationship that we have because we are both involved in pro boxing as inspectors in overseeing bouts here. I’d say it’s more unique than anything.”

Keeping with this being a non-scholarship program, Martino’s capacity as head coach is a volunteer position. His full-time gig is for the Washoe County Department of Juvenile Services, a position he has held for two decades. Martino also works part-time as an inspector for the Nevada State Athletic Commission.

“We’re volunteer coaches,” he said. “So it’s not a job, it’s an adventure so to speak. I’ve been involved with the program since 1977 as a boxer, assistant coach and now head coordinator. We balance it. It’s rewarding to see these young men come through our program who become successful student-athletes and then graduate. While we are a sport, we enjoy seeing them succeed and are proud of their accomplishments in the ring, but we’re as much interested in them being successful and graduating. That’s the balance, seeing how they can balance an academic load with the demands of a sport like boxing.”

Martino offered the following assessment of this year’s team. “We had a bunch of our young men graduated last year,” he said. “So we’re in a rebuilding stage. We lost two of our national champs, which was a big blow to us. They had both been here for four years. David Schacter was a four-time national champ and Thomas Genarro, a two-time national champ.”

Nevada did return Ryan Kotey, a two-time national champion at 156 pounds and Kenny Dyer-Redner, the 2008 national runner-up in the 185-pound weight class. As for the newcomers, in a January 30 event, five boxers made their collegiate debuts. Two of them, Rodolfo Zorrilla at 132 pounds, Luke Tiano at 135 pounds, won their debut bouts. Brett Burgard had to retire from his bout at 156 pounds because of an injured shoulder but junior Stefan Michaelson of Iceland won by decision and Jeremy Catalano of Spanish Springs HS won a shortened bout that was stopped in the third round by the referee.

Being a non-scholarship program carries with it some inherent challenges. “Recruiting kids year in and year out (is our biggest challenge),” Martino said. “It’s a club sport and kids come to us with little or no boxing experience. We ask a lot of them because there are not scholarships. They have to figure out how to train with a busy schedule with school.”

“A lot of them have jobs and some have families,” he said. “We tell them that boxing is not going to be their No. 1 priority, education is while you are at campus. It’s difficult to challenge these boys because you want them to come to the gym more often, but you also have to be realistic. They have to schedule their training around their busy schedules of academics and employment.”

It has been three decades since Martino laced them up himself in the program and he sees how the sport has changed considerably since then. “It’s much more competitive,” he said. “We’re finding that the service academies have really challenged the other schools to elevate their level of competition. We train pretty much year around now. We don’t compete year around but we open the gym up for the kids who want to come in and allow them to train in the gym year around. We’ll work around their schedules on weekends and things like that. It’s much more competitive than when I was boxing.”

One thing is for sure, whenever boxers from the program compete, they receive their share of respect. “It’s been difficult so far this year to match our boxers appropriately in experience and weight because the majority of our kids have had no fights coming into the season and you don’t want to overmatch our boxers,” Martino said. “

“We take pride in the fact that our boxers are some of the more skilled college boxers because of our head trainer Greg Rice,” he said. “He’s really a stickler on the fundamentals. We get complimented all the time. People say that our kids might not be the toughest, but they’re the most skilled boxers.”

Lady Pack Loses

The University of Nevada women basketball team fell in the final
game of the WAC Tournament falling to Fresno 56-49 Saturday afternoon at Lawlor Events Center in front of 2,281 fans.

With the loss third-seeded Nevada fell to 18-14 overall while the top-seeded Fresno State Bulldogs improved to 24-8 and earned the conference’s automatic bid to the NCAA Tournament.

Shavon Moore led Nevada with 10 points and eight rebounds while Dellena Criner scored nine points. Brandi Jones recorded eight rebounds and scored eight points.

Nevada had a six-point lead 10-4, with 15:30 left in the half before Fresno State tied the game at 14-14 with 12:04. The Bulldogs extended its lead to nine, 27-18, with just over two minutes and pushed its lead to 11, 31-20, at the
half.

Jones, Moore and Cherlanda Franklin each had four points at half for the Pack.

The Pack shot 39.1 percent (9-of-23) from the floor in the first half while

Fresno State shot 28.2 percent (11-of-39) from the floor.

In the second, Nevada went on a 14-5 run to open the half and tied the game at 36-36 with 14:01 left in the game. Fresno State pushed its lead back to six, 47-41, with 6:36 remaining in the game.

Nevada tied the game at 47-47 on a layup by Brandi Jones with 5:08 left in the game but Nevada was held to just one field goal over the final five minutes of the game as the Bulldogs posted the 56-49 win.

As a team Nevada shot 38.5 percent (20-of-52) from the floor while Fresno State shot 31.3 percent (21-of-67) from the floor. Fresno State outrebounded Nevada 56-49 in the game including 26 offensive rebounds to the Pack’s nine.

Mascot Madness

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