Scott Erickson was a major-league All-Star at 23, won 142 games and was twice a World Series starting pitcher who went on to earn more than $47 million.
Before Friday’s Territorial Cup opener at Hi Corbett Field, the 48-year-old TV analyst stood in the outfield taping the Pac-12 Networks’ pre-game show.
It took four takes to get it right.
If broadcasting is that troublesome, imagine how difficult it is to pitch in the big leagues, or against Arizona State, or any Pac-12 team.
That’s how it seemed in the top of the first inning, when Arizona’s previously undefeated-at-home (6-0) Nathan Bannister yielded five runs; the Sun Devils eased to an in-your-face, 5-2 victory.
It was likely Bannister’s final career start at Hi Corbett Field, and if anyone from the jumbo crowd of 6,324 knew how it felt, it was Erickson.
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In 1989, as an Arizona junior, Erickson was the most dominant pitcher in college baseball. He took an 18-2 record into the Regional championship game at Sancet-Kindall Field. The UA had all but booked its tickets to the College World Series.
Alas, Long Beach State hit everything Erickson threw and jumped to a 10-1 lead. One of the best teams in UA history, ranked No. 1 for part of the season, lost 10-3. Erickson quietly sat alone in the dugout long after the game.
Season over.
If the 2016 Wildcats are fortunate, if they can win either of the two remaining Territorial Cup games this weekend, they seem sure to be playing in June, when the NCAA tournament begins.
Bannister will get another chance to get it right, but on Friday, ASU’s linescore — a 5 followed by eight zeroes — might as well have meant 500,000,000 to 2. That’s how imposing those five runs seemed when coupled with the shutdown pitching of Seth Martinez and Eder Erives.
Arizona coach Jay Johnson didn’t exaggerate quite as much. “It seemed like 50-0,” he said.
Tucson was so hungry for a baseball game that meant something, and especially one against ASU, that more than 4,000 tickets were sold in advance of Friday’s game. That hunger, untreated since Arizona’s 2012 national championship, is such that more than 5,000 tickets had been sold 24 hours before Saturday’s game.
“This is why I came to coach here,” said Johnson.
Showing up is one thing, beating the Sun Devils is another. It has always been hard.
“Uncle Mo was definitely on their side tonight,” said UA third baseman Bobby Dalbec.
Momentum doesn’t often have a long life in this series.
The UA lists its career record against ASU as 245-214, dating to 1907. But the Sun Devils prefer to say the series didn’t begin until 1959, and that they have a commanding 197-127 margin.
Both sides have a good point. In 1954, when Arizona played in the College World Series for the first time, it didn’t even schedule ASU. Why? A year earlier, 1953, Arizona beat the Sun Devils (then called the Bulldogs) 25-8, 14-4, 13-2 and 7-0.
It was batting practice.
But by 1958, when Hall of Fame coach Bobby Winkles was hired, the UA-ASU series became a blood feud. It didn’t take long come of age; by 1964, ASU swept the Wildcats in Tempe and since then it has been the most compelling of all the Territorial Cup rivalries.
Now, a half-century later, people stand 12-deep in line to get a hot dog at Hi Corbett Field, and park at the distant El Con shopping center. Saturday’s lines to get a hot dog might be 14 or 15 deep.
The main difference between UA and ASU over the years is that the Sun Devils have been able to deploy scores of star-level Phoenix-area players like Bob Horner and Andre Ethier, while Arizona has to fill in from all parts of the map.
The Sun Devils didn’t even recruit Bannister, who might be the Pac-12 pitcher of the year, even though he is from Peoria. “No,” he said after the game, “not even a phone call.”
ASU started six Phoenix players Friday; Arizona has one Tucson starter, freshman catcher Cesar Salazar, and just two on the entire roster. The UA infrequently produces a star-level hometown product like Ron Hassey, George Arias or Eddie Leon.
ASU’s two leading players, Martinez, who is from Peoria, and shortstop Colby Woodmansee, who is from Phoenix, are both local kids. That’s the most significant gap between the programs.
To combat that, Johnson has recruited Phoenix as aggressively as any UA coach. His first recruiting class includes shortstop Cameron Cannon from Mountain Ridge High and pitcher Austin Nichols of Queen Creek. He has at least five more known commitments from Phoenix prospects who are high school underclassmen.
“This is the University of Arizona,” he said. “We want the best players in Arizona.”
The best team in Arizona, 2016, has yet to be determined. That will be played out Saturday and Sunday. Or will it?
Forty years ago Sunday, May 15, 1976, ASU completed a three-game sweep in Tucson and went into the College World Series ranked No. 1. It beat Arizona seven straight games that season, but in the World Series semifinals, Arizona stunned ASU and went on to win its first of four national championships.
That makes Friday’s ‘’500,000,000 to 2” line score seem a bit more manageable.
