EL SEGUNDO HERALD February 18, 2016 Page 5 Previewing the NL West By Adam Serrao Now that the football season has come and gone, it’s time to lace up the cleats and break out the balls and bats. The sun is beginning to shine again, the grass is getting greener and that warm, crisp breeze in the air is telling us all that baseball is on the way. As Eagles Playoff Ready? See NL West, page 13 See Eagles, page 6 2016 EL SEGUNDO ELECTIONS Residents and Business Owners El Segundo’s Election is on April, 12, 2016 Have any questions for your City Council candidates? Send them to us at management@heraldpublications.com We will not be able to publish all submissions. the season hastily approaches, it is quickly becoming clearer that the National League West will have a much different look this year. The Los Angeles Dodgers have had a strangle hold on first place over the last three seasons in the division, but will this year bring devastating changes to the land of L.A. and the NL West? Naturally, we here in Los Angeles want to jump the gun, fast forward all the way to October, and predict that the Dodgers will be the lone team surviving from the NL West, on their way to the World Series. Not so fast. This year was a year of big changes for the Boys in Blue - some good and some bad. Despite having Major League Baseball’s biggest payroll, however, former manager Don Mattingly and the Dodgers have failed to get past the Championship Series in the last three years. A loss to the Cardinals in the NLCS in 2013 was then followed with two straight losses in the NLDS in 2014 and 2015. Sure, the Dodgers won their division all three years, but the goal has been and always will be the World Series. The Dodgers haven’t been to the World Series since 1988. Naturally, that’s a position that the team is going all-out to try to get back to. So, out goes Mattingly and in comes Dave Roberts; a well-regarded coach who has never managed a day in his life. It sounds bad on the surface, but Mattingly never managed a day before taking over the Dodgers, either. Fans can only hope that players like Yasiel Puig, for instance, are more receptive to Roberts than they ever were to Mattingly. Roberts wasn’t the only change. Zack Greinke stayed in division and moved over to the Arizona Diamondbacks. The move was a huge blow to the Dodgers, losing a player who combined with Clayton Kershaw to form a dominant one-two punch at the top of the rotation that went a combined 104-34 with a 2.10 ERA over the last three seasons. Lefty Scott Kazmir joined the team and will now be looked upon to fill Greinke’s roll as a No. 2 starter, which will undoubtedly be difficult to do. Aside from Kazmir, the Dodgers failed to make a significant splash this offseason, as they have been accustomed to do under their new ownership. Youngster Corey Seager will finally get a full season in the Major’s to prove himself at shortstop, while Joc Pederson will look to rebound from a rollercoaster year in center field that saw him riding the bench come the end of last season. There is a lot yet to be written about this new-look Dodgers club in what will be an extremely long and trying 162 game season. Though anything can happen throughout the course of that time, L.A. looks to have third place written all over them in this year’s NL West. That brings us to the San Francisco Giants. The hated San Francisco Giants, who seemingly win the World Series every other year. This may be their year again. Bruce Bochy, in his 10th year as manger of the Giants, will boast one of the strongest pitching attacks in the entire league. Any baseball fan knows of the prowess of Madison Bumgarner. He will now be joined by World Series winner Johnny Cueto, right-hander Jeff Samardzija, and a back-end of the rotation that will feature Matt Cain, Jake Peavy and Chris Heston, who won 12 games last year in his rookie season. With the re-signing of Brandon Crawford, the arrival of Denard Span to play center field, and the usual steady hands of Buster Posey behind the plate and City of El Segundo is now hiring for part-time positions We’ve merged! Expanding what’s possible with money is now (888) 422-2287 . www.abacuswealth.com Drivers starting at $15.93/hour Lifeguards starting at $12.45/hour Visit www.elsegundo.org and click on City Jobs, Part-Time Opportunities for more information or call (310) 524-2700 Story and photos by Gregg McMullin The high school regular season winter sports schedule is in the books. It’s now time for the playoffs after a long, and at times, challenging season. It was expected that all five El Segundo high school teams that participated including girl’s and boys’ soccer, girls’ and boys’ basketball and girls’ water polo would advance to the post season. The boys’ soccer team repeated their Ocean League title by going 8-2 this season. A year ago the Eagles were co-champs along with Lawndale but this season the Eagles won it outright. They did it with a stingy defense that allowed a league low six goals against while scoring a league high 25 goals. After a somewhat sketchy start to the season, where the Eagles were just 2-5-1, they turned it all around to finish 11-7-1 overall. Facing Lawndale for an opportunity to win their first league title outright since 1990 seemed all too appropriate and the players were looking forward for redemption for sharing the title last season. “We’ve been pointing to this game all year long. We knew what could be at stake if all went the way we were all focused on,” The defense has played inspired soccer all year long but against Lawndale they stepped it up a notch. The end result was an inspired 3-0 victory for the Eagles that had players ecstatic afterwards. Justin Knoll took a free kick from midfield and Tyler Villalobos headed the ball to Cortez, who was fouled in the penalty box. Cortez scored on the ensuing penalty kick to give the Eagles a 1-0 lead. The Eagles made it 2-0 in the 56th minute when Julian Cantinia scored on a header off a long throw-in from Grant Bemis. Then offense put the game out of reach when Cortez sent a pass to Villalobos, who scored on a breakaway in the 67th minute to give the Eagles a 3-0 lead. Though the offense showed more stamina, grit and determination than their opponents make no mistake it was the defense led by Daniel Gutierrez, Zach Franco, Zach Skwarek and Knoll as well as goalkeeper Tyler Hollick’s five saves, that set the tone for the shutout. Head coach Andrew Kelly said it was a total team effort and a league championship to be proud of. The Eagles will enter the CIF-SS Division 4 playoffs and host Temecula Valley at 3pm on Friday. The Golden Bears placed second in a rugged Southwestern League. Should the Eagles win they’ll most likely face fourth seeded Bellflower on Wednesday at a site TBD. Girls’ Soccer The girls’ soccer team finished a disappointing third place in the Ocean League. Disappointing because of the close games they lost including a 2-1 loss to Lawndale, a 3-2 loss to Santa Monica and a 1-0 loss to Culver City. As head coach Tony Hobbs explained there were injuries and illnesses the past few games that prevented his strongest lineup to be on the field. In the 3-2 loss against league champion Santa Monica, the Eagles took a 2-0 lead in the first half with goals by Cate Post and Carlee Brasher. The Vikings would score off a long rebound in the first half and then managed two second half goals to pull out the win. Still the Lady Eagles (11-6-4) have had a wonderful season having won more games than last season and winning 10 or more games for the third consecutive season. The Eagles face Marlborough on the road today at 3pm. The Mustangs snuck into the playoffs with a 5-4-7 record but still drew a home game. Should the Eagles win they’ll most likely face a daunting task in hosting fourth seeded Royal on Tuesday at 3pm. Boys’ Basketball “The Los Angeles Dodgers have had a strangle hold on first place over the last three seasons in the division, but will this year bring devastating changes to the land of L.A. and the NL West?” “It was expected that all five El Segundo high school teams that participated including girl’s and boys’ soccer, girls’ and boys’ basketball and girls’ water polo would advance to the post season.”
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