Page 4 March 9, 2017 Hawthorne Softball Readies for Liftoff By Adam Serrao There’s nothing quite like the sound of a ball pinging off of an aluminum bat as a runner sprints away from home plate and around the bases. It’s that time of the year again when the girls of the Ocean League will lace up their cleats, pull up their stirrups, and take to the diamond. The beginning of softball signifies the end of a long, cold winter. The great amount of rain that California received this past year ensures that the grass will be even greener and the air will be that much crisper as the Hawthorne Cougars’ softball team attempts to steal away an Ocean League title. A team that was extremely competitive one season ago gains even more experience and maturity this year as the Lady Cougars head into the regular season with a young and aggressive group of girls from Hawthorne High. It was just one season ago that the Lady Cougars were giving their rivals from the Ocean League a run for their money under the coaching abilities of Jerry Contreras. Contreras led his team into a season that was full of ups and downs, but began with high expectations for Hawthorne. The opening of the softball season brought with it an excellent start for the Cougars. Four wins in a row, highlighted by an 18-0 shutout victory over Serra, had everyone believing that Hawthorne was the real deal. Every team hits a slump eventually. Unfortunately for the Lady Cougars, that slump soon followed. Contreras’s team lost three of five games heading into a league play schedule that really seemed to put Hawthorne to the test. The Cougars enjoyed victories over their rivals from Culver City and Santa Monica and were able to sweep both Beverly Hills and Lawndale. Unfortunately, two losses to the eventual league champion El Segundo Eagles set Hawthorne back in the standings and forced the team to a third place finish in the standings. Even still, the Cougars were able to sneak into the playoffs with a victory over Monrovia in a wild card game. Monrovia wound up putting up quite the fight against Hawthorne, but ultimately it was a Cougars offense led by senior Alyssa Casillas and freshman Mia Darancou that paved the way for a 6-4 victory. The win, however, meant that Hawthorne would match up with last year’s CIF champions, the North High Saxons, in the first round of the playoffs. The Saxons steamrolled past everyone last season on their way to a title and the Cougars were their first victims. Hawthorne’s year would ultimately come to an end with a 5-2 loss in the first round of the Southern Section Division 4 playoffs. Despite the disappointing end to the season, the Cougars are back and full of firepower on offense this year—led by last season’s first-year standout Darancou. Now as a sophomore, Darancou will be looking to lead a team that is full of returning talent, including junior starter Natalie Rocha. Joining Darancou and Rocha from last season’s team will be seniors Vanessa Perez, Adriana Bood and Adriana Saucedo, as well as junior Alyssa Rodriguez. The experience that this team full of youthful talent gained from an up-and-down season one year ago will be the key to their success this year. The firepower provided by Darancou and Rocha should be enough to keep this year’s Cougars team in the running for an Ocean League championship, at the very least. The regular season has already begun for the Hawthorne softball team--and through only two games, the Lady Cougars look to be exactly where they want to be. As expected, Hawthorne’s offense has been on full display in the early going and led the team to a 2-0 record through their first two games of the very young season. In those same first two games, the Cougars have outscored their opponents’ by a total score of 27-7 behind the hot bat of the sophomore Darancou. Despite the team’s early success, Hawthorne will have to look to avoid a letdown similar to the one that the team experienced last season. Difficult matchups against teams such as the West High Warriors and Torrance Tartars of the Pioneer League await before an always challenging league play schedule featuring games against the likes of El Segundo and Santa Monica get started near the end of March. High school softball is back and ready to take center stage once again in the Los Angeles area. The Lady Cougars have finished in third place in their division in three of the past five seasons, with two second place finishes in between. With a team that is constantly knocking on the door of a league championship, Coach Contreras and his players hope that 2017 can finally be their year. Only time will tell as a long and challenging season waits, but this Lady Cougars team certainly has the talent and ability to make history on the softball diamond. • This Year, Dodgers Could Win It All By Adam Serrao The Los Angeles Dodgers’ last World Series appearance came in 1988 when the Boys in Blue beat a heavily favored Oakland Athletics ballclub in five games. Though that was almost 30 years ago, the Dodgers have been consistently knocking on the World Series door for years now and may finally have what it takes to break that door down. Los Angeles has won over 90 games in each of the last four seasons and has won six division championships in the last nine years. This time, though, brings the feeling of a season that will mold youth together with veteran leadership to push the Dodgers up and over the ledge that they have been stuck on for years now. If you’ve been a fan of the Los Angeles Dodgers over the past few years, then the team that you will see take the field at the beginning of this regular season should be one that looks rather familiar. After a 91-71 record and a first place finish in the NL West one year ago, Dodgers General Manager Farhan Zaidi and President of Baseball Operations Andrew Friedman didn’t have to do much to a roster that was already laden with talent. The biggest enemy of the Dodgers and their success, though, has been health. If the team can simply stay on the field, it will have as good of a chance as ever to capture a championship trophy this season. Clayton Kershaw is the best pitcher on the entire planet. Naturally, his health is the key to any Dodgers prolonged postseason success. Last year, Kershaw suffered a back injury that caused the ace to miss over two months of game action heading right into the playoffs. All indications are that the Cy Young Award winner has looked like his old self this preseason and should be poised to rack up more awards of the like in the very near future. Along with Kershaw, the Dodger pitching staff should be one that instills fear in opponents this season. Last year 16-game-winner Kenta Maeda will slide down to be the team’s number three starter and should come into 2017 with much more strength after undergoing an offseason conditioning program that has caused the former Nippon Professional League standout to put on much more weight and muscle mass. With a 2.12 ERA last season, Rich Hill will take over the number two spot behind Kershaw, leaving Julio Urias, who won’t turn 21 until August, to slide in at the back end of the rotation at the four spot. With another year of maturity behind him, Urias should be poised to experience a breakout season. That will leave Scott Kazmir, Brandon McCarthy, Hyun-Jin Ryu, Alex Wood, Brock Stewart and Ross Stripling to all contend for the final spot in the rotation. For once, the Dodgers are incredibly deep on the mound. Backing up the pitching staff, the Dodgers have the luxury to rely on the services of new second baseman Logan Forsythe this year. Despite Forsythe’s addition, the Dodgers kept Chase Utley around to be the incredible clubhouse presence that he is and to fill in as a utility player at most any spot in the infield. Forsythe, however, will bring even more power to an already deep batting order. The ex-Tampa Bay Ray hit 20 home runs one year ago. His presence, along with shortstop Corey Seager, first baseman Adrian Gonzalez, and Justin Turner at the hot corner, should make for one of the most formidable infields in the entire league. The Dodgers’ outfield presents a mess of sorts, but a good mess at that. Joc Pederson will hold down centerfield and may perhaps be the only everyday player to patrol the outfield for Los Angeles this season. Andre Ethier will be back to fight with Yasiel Puig for time in right field--which could be a good problem to have-- while the speedy Andrew Toles, who played in 48 big-league games one year ago, will most likely have the left field job to himself. Scott Van Slyke, Enrique Hernandez, Trayce Thompson and the newly acquired Franklin Gutierrez will all battle for fill-in time, should they all make the Opening Day roster. As we know from one year ago, second-year manager Dave Robert’s most prized possession is his bullpen. Kenley Jansen will fortunately be back to anchor that pen, while Pedro Baez will unfortunately be back to incredibly slow down the pace of play by taking at least 30 seconds to throw each pitch. Roberts seems to get the most out of his relievers, though, even if nobody has ever heard of them before. Look for names like Adam Liberatore, Josh Fields, Grant Dayton and a newly acquired Sergio Romo from the San Francisco Giants to receive a lot of the nods from Roberts as he walks out of the dugout this season. The team will also most likely rely on whichever pitchers do not make the starting rotation to fill in for long relief, giving the bullpen some of the most talented depth in the league. The Guggenheim ownership group has certainly not held back when it has come to the idea of spending money on their Los Angeles Dodgers team. That’s why it’s easy for the owners to control great talent on offense, a great pitching staff, and great talent on defense. What cannot be controlled, however, is health. If this year’s Dodgers team can somehow stay healthy throughout an entire 162-game regular season, then it will remain one of the favorites to win the World Series. It has been a long and difficult 29 years for Dodger fans, but this just may be the season that a championship trophy arrives back in L.A. • – Asixlion@earthlink.net
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