OCR Text |
Show Blooming Late Earns Barnett Spot At Utah By DAVE WIGHAM Clipper Sports BOUNTIFUL -- You won't find his name written in the Viewmont High baseball record books. In fact if you talked to folks about that 1980 Viking team his name would probably seldom be mentioned. About the only place you'll find his name is written in the starting lineup as the center fielder for the University of Utah. MIKE BARNETT has worked his way up to be a starter for the Utes this past season, his junior year in school, and everyone expects bigger and better things from Mike in his senior campaign. He came out of Viewmont with a .320 batting average but the scouts just weren't interested in this speedy yet frail outfielder. He had started for Wade Bender at Vikingland for two seasons and had showed flashes of brilliance but still no one was knocking on his door to play college ball. "SOME OF my friends talked me into walking walk-ing on at Utah to try to play so I did it" he joked. The coach at the time was Mike Weathers Weath-ers who talked to Mike briefly and encouraged him, and about 49 other players, to attend a try out camp. The camp itself lasted for four days after which the coach invited ten of the players to remain on the team. "The idea at that time was to start a junior varsity program but they dropped it before we played any games" Mike noted. That freshman year was a new experience for Mike. The coach got a new job halfway through the season and from that point on he just cruised through the season using the veteran veter-an players and staying with them no matter what happened. Mike did get into some varsity games as a pinch runner but that was about the extent of his duty. THAT SUMMER Lonnie Keeter took over as the head baseball man and Mike got a new lease on life. The new coach had never seen Mike play so he attended the American Legion tournament that he played in, "he then talked to me after the tournament and said he liked what he saw so he offered me a scholarship. That's probably the only reason I went back out for baseball." During those winter months of his sophomore sopho-more year Mike went after a starting spot hard and he won the left field spot. He stayed there all through pre-season but then the coach moved him to centerfield. "He wanted to get more speed into the out field so he moved me over and another player with good speed into left." When asked what he did during the winter win-ter to impress the coaches the mild mannered speedster simply replied "Our pitchers were throwing to us and I was hitting extremely well." That year he lifted his batting average to .310 for the year. HIS EFFORTS again were rewarded in his junior year, the one just completed, as the Utes elected Mike to one of their tri-captains along with his starting position in centerfield. The big difference this year though was the fact that Mike learned to become a switch hitter. "The coaches approached me about batting left last year during the summer. I thought they were crazy. I had never even tried to bat left. One game during that summer I decided to give it a shot. I had a terrible swing but I didn't strike out and that gave me a little confidence. At least I was making contact and that was all the encouragement I needed." From that point on Mike went to work on his own to become a good switch hitter. He took a batting T home with him and spent many hours on his swing. Then he would go up to the school and hit against the batting machine for hours on end, and then finally in the fall he faced some live pitching. "I still didn't have a smooth swing but the coaches showed confidence confi-dence in me and told me to stick with it." STICK WITH it is exactly what he did and in a game at Colorado State he showed he had finally arrived as a switch hitter. "In the fourth inning we were down by two runs and I came up right handed with two men on. I drilled a home run to put us up by one. They came back and tied the score and I came up in the eighth with a man on base, only this time they had a different pitcher and I went up left handed. I drilled a two run homer this time to put us up by see BARNETT next pg. f Barnett two" he beamed. It would have been a t, act he says but in the bottom of the ninth s, guy from CSU hit a three run shot to nir Utes by a run, "that took a little thunder 0f my day" he admitted. Mike's average dipped a little this past ., to 280 but that's great considering 90 pe,! f of the time he hit left handed for the first tirr- his career. He did manage to get 0n , enough times to set a school record for,, steals in a season. Mike ended the year with thefts while only being caught five times.' HE HAS his goals set for his senior year would like to become an all-WAC perf0n. he was nominated this past season but his; $ ting average was a little low. Then he pJ( like to break his own school record in steals y should be able to do that, we had a lot of p rained out that we missed." College baseball is a job, make no mis- K about it, and Mike Barnett is your basic b 1 collar worker who likes to get down and d; & "The time involved is something else, y0, your schooling paid for but you really ha-.t put out for it." "COLLEGE BASEBALL is a lot diffe:, than high school, it's much faster and it; f advanced. The coaches really know their;- (, and they have the time to coach the indivic; whereas in high school most of the time is p jt in playing the games." Mike added that bi a ball is a year round sport on the college la with a 30 game fall schedule and then d i: workouts during the winter months and the actual season. Mike encourages the high school pk, who want to just walk on and give collegeh . try. "Obviously not all high school playem make the team but there are certainly si u that could. It surprised me that I made iheu: t and I'm just thankful for the people thai ij j encouraging me to stick with it. I'm glad! now" he smiled. f THE UTAH coaches are also glad that y. p stuck with it. He's our basic hard worker earns his spot story. No one has put inn: i time and effort toward bettering himself it sport than Mike Barnett. As his high sc; ? coach Wade Bender noted, "There's ok j that proved hard work pays off." By his own admission he's about 100 1 the player now than he was in high school- ' he didn't get there without pain. Sure be! excellent speed and a strong throwing am: if it weren't for dedication and a lot of r--Mike Barnett wouldn't be playing collegeb; , ball today. , e |