Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: TUESDAY, May 1, 1990 TAG: 9005010051
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: B4 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Bill Brill
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
For nine of the 11 years - including the first eight - that Chuck Hartman has been Virginia Tech's baseball coach, it was his task to take the Hokies to Florida State for the Metro Conference Tournament.
Which is just one good reason Tech's otherwise distinguished record under the feisty Hartman never has included a Metro title. Florida State, a perennial top-10 team, has won nine of those championships, including the past seven.
But things are changing slightly in the Metro, although not at Florida State. The Seminoles, third in last year's College World Series, are 40-10 and rated ninth in the Baseball America poll and sixth in the Collegiate Baseball poll.
However, the Metro has gone to an alternating regular-season schedule and a rotating tournament site. Thus, Florida State will make its first trip to Virginia to play Tech next week, and the Metro Tournament will be played at Southern Mississippi in Hattiesburg.
Next year, Tech will be the host team for the Metro, which will be played either in Blacksburg or at Municipal Field in Salem.
The opener of the three-game series, one week from today, will be played in Salem, and the goal is to put the proceeds into Hartman's program. Game time is 7:30 and follows Tech's annual spring fling, a fund-raising get-together.
If there is one sport that consistently has been successful at Tech, it is baseball. The program always has been pretty good - 28 winning seasons out of the past 29 - but under Hartman, 55, it has been really good.
This year the Hokies are 32-12, running Hartman's mark at Tech to 458-188-2. Counting his 19 years at High Point (N.C.) College, resulting in his selection to the NAIA Hall of Fame, Hartman is 941-413-2. He is seventh among active coaches in victories. His last nine teams at High Point and all except his first at Tech have won at least 30 games. His 1982 Hokies finished 50-9 and ranked 10th in the nation.
For all of that success, however, Tech has been only a regional hit. It hasn't been to the NCAA Tournament under Hartman - the last of four bids came in 1977 - although the coach said he thinks a good finish this year could mean a slot in the 48-team field.
There is a perfectly good reason Tech hasn't been able to build upon a good thing under Hartman, a 1957 graduate of North Carolina. It is the same thing that plagues Tech in other sports - money, or more accurately, lack of money.
The Hokies offer the NCAA limit of scholarships in baseball, but that doesn't tell the whole story. Hartman's recruiting budget of $4,800 limits where he can seek talent and how long he can stay on the road.
Which is why this game in Salem is being played.
"We want to raise money for baseball," said David Saunders, a Tech alumnus. "We think if Chuck had enough money, he could put us in Omaha [Neb., site of the College World Series]."
Saunders, a Roanoke Realtor, is nothing if not outspoken. He said he thinks Tech baseball is being unwisely shortchanged, and he hopes this game will produce enough funds to enhance Hartman's budget.
"Tech people [complain], but don't give," Saunders said Monday. "We're egomaniacs with an inferiority complex."
Saunders understands Tech well.
Hartman said he figures Florida State and South Carolina have recruiting budgets in the $25,000 range, roughly five times that of the Hokies. What Hartman would like to do with additional funds is pay an assistant more money "and keep him on the road as a recruiter. That's what the big boys do."
Hartman surprised himself once when he recruited Franklin Stubbs out of a small town in North Carolina. Stubbs now is with the Houston Astros after years with the Los Angeles Dodgers. "If you saw 40 like Stubbs every year, you'd wind up with two or three of them," he said.
But it would take a full-time recruiter.
There are other financial needs for baseball at Tech, which plays in brand-new English Field. For starters, some $150,000 would put in lights. That is in the works during Tech's present Campaign for Excellence, but it would be nice to have the lights sooner.
With lights, perhaps ESPN would come calling. "That would certainly help exposure," Hartman said.
And, until the games can be played after dark, the Metro Tournament might have to be in Salem.
"[With lights], we definitely would have had an Appalachian League franchise in Blacksburg," Hartman said.
This is a starting point, Saunders said. He and Hartman hope for a large crowd. Florida State is the best game on the schedule, and the series is for the Metro lead. Despite the difference in recruiting budgets, Tech is first and the Seminoles second in the standings.
With comparable finances, who knows what Hartman's Hokies could do. This game is viewed as a first pitch in an effort to find out.
by CNB