The Ventura County Star is reporting that the powerhouse Oxnard High baseball team, in charge of the Pacific View League race just 10 days ago, now apparently will miss the CIF-Southern Section Division I playoffs. According to league officials, as many as four Yellowjackets players have been playing in an adult league on Sundays, which has caused Oxnard to forfeit five league victories. Following Oxnard’s 7-5 loss to Rio Mesa on Tuesday, the Yellowjackets fall to fourth place in league at 6-8 (14-11 overall) with only one league game remaining today. “Only the top three teams in our league go to the playoffs,” said Tony Diaz, athletic director for the Pacific View League. “So Oxnard would be out. The CIF-SS has no spot for wild-card teams in Division I.” Diaz said Oxnard High officials made the discovery about the illegal participation this week, and revealed the infraction to the league. “They self-reported it,” said Diaz.

There’s been some confusion as to whether La Caada will be awarded an at-large berth into the CIF-Southern Section Division IV playoffs. The Spartans finished fourth in the tough Rio Hondo League this season. The only thing up in the air is whether Monrovia will clinch the title outright today, but they need to beat a pesky South Pasadena team. If the Wildcats win, they’re outright champions, if the Wildcats lose and San Marino wins, they clinch a share of the league title but Monrovia moves ahead as the league’s No. 1 team because they own the season-series. Back to La Caada … Spartans coach Dennis Ballard sent paper work Wednesday to the CIF-Southern Section office and now patiently waits. Ballard said it is their incentive to win today to boost La Caada’s record and show it belongs in the playoffs. But the debate lies whether a team from a new league that just moved up to Division IV would be awarded an at-large berth, if the Division IV is awarded an at-large berth at all. The brackets are released Monday. “I think it’s going to happen but CIF is very unpredictable,” Ballard said. “We’re going forward with playing as if our season will continue.” La Caada is 16-6 and also won the Southern California Invitational early in the season. “We put that on our sheet,” said Ballard with a chuckle. It’ll be too bad if the Spartans don’t get an at-large berth considering the tight race in the RHL race this season. They turned it around this season after finishing 11-10 last year. “Truly, as far as baseball, it’s been a three-team situation in the past years and now with San Marino it’s four. When you put four teams that can knock each other off it can be crazy. It’s fun and exciting to watch but not that fun to coach to be able to go from first to fourth. It’s been kind of crazy.” Ballard talked about last week’s tough test, facing Monrovia and Temple City on the same week, losing twice. “We just didn’t hit the ball well,” Ballard said. “These teams just stepped up and played some great games. We played some excellent competition but it was difficult day-to-day because the pressure was on and that’s all we talked about. We got a little disheartened but we got back together, had fun and relaxed, and that’s how you have to go at it; you can’t put too much pressure on yourself.”

Lets hope CIF does the right thing.

Bishop Amat coach Andy Nieto and the rest of his team showed its support for La Salle baseball coach Harry Agajanian who was suspended Monday for what’s left of the the regular-season in what La Salle officials are calling a violation of school policy. Without going into all the details, school officials can confirm that Agajanian’s suspension stems from a players refusal not to play in a game against Cantwell Sacred Heart. Agajanian sent that player to the bus after his refusal to play, and words were later exchanged. School officials met, and felt a suspension was warranted. The Lancers played Bishop Amat yesterday and the coaches taped Agajanian’s number on their hats. It was a gesture that surely meant a lot for Agajanian. How classy of your opponent to show support. It shows how well-liked Agajanian is among his colleagues. Agajanian had a meeting today with the principal to discuss his future with the baseball program. We’ll have more as it becomes available.

Arcadia native Mirai Nagasu appears on this month’s Sports Illustrated Kids cover in newsstands now. The 16-year-old won the 2008 national championships in figure skating and looks forward to competing in the 2010 Olympics. Says her coach Charlene Wong: “I think she’s more comfortable as a school girl who skates than as a skater who goes to school.” This month’s issue introduces 20 superstar athletes under the age of 20 for 2009 as part of the magazine’s 20th birthday celebration. Matt Barkley also graces the cover in recognition of his stellar performance as a four-year starting quarterback at Mater Dei. In 2007, he became the first junior to win the Gatorade Male High School National Athlete of the Year award.

We received an interesting memo from Media News Group executives outlining future plans that will likely end free access to our newspaper websites. Robledo posted this on his blog so I’m going to piggy back what he wrote and let you guys discuss it.

What do you think about possibly having to pay a subscription free or register to gain online access? How this affects the blog, I do not know.

Here is an important part of the memo that reads, in part:

“We will begin to move away from putting all of our newspaper content online for free. Instead, we will explore a variety of premium offerings that apply real value to our print content. We are not trying to invent new premium products, but instead tell our existing print readers that what they are buying has real value, and to our online audience (who don’t buy the print edition), that if you want access to all online content, you are going to have to register, and/or pay. If a non-subscriber wants the newspaper content in its entirety online, they will be directed to some sort of registration or pay vehicle (and if they are a print subscriber, they will have full access at no charge). To be clear, the brand value proposition to the consumer is that the newspaper is a product, whether in print or online, which must be paid for.”

In other words, you can help yourself and help us all out by going back to the old days of home delivery, it’s cheap, and will give you access to everything else for free. You can read the memo by clicking here to learn more. There is no set date when this will all begin, but I’m curious, how do you feel about these changes?