Temple City's Barry Bacon takes issue with new CIF rule
After talking about Temple City's 6-1 loss to Sonora in Tuesday's wild-card round of the CIF-Southern Section Division IV playoffs and summarizing the season, I asked Rams coach Barry Bacon to talk about the crazy Rio Hondo League season that saw constant movement in the standings.
"It was really fun knowing any given day someone was going to get beat and we were going to move the standings. We've been playing CIF mentality since the Monrovia loss; you lose, you screw yourself, but (then) CIF decides to open their wallet and let everybody in the playoffs. In my opinion, I wouldn't do that. I don't believe in letting everybody play. We finished third, we face a third-place team which is better than most of our Valley. La Cañada finishes fourth and faces a third-place team. I don't believe in that. I don't want to dis (La Cañada) but if you finish third you have a right to go to the first round. With this division there's 12 leagues, so you have 36 to 37 teams so you have wild cards. The Rio Hondo League team is a good league and we have to travel to play Sonora, which was in first place last week? They are the class of this league, and (CIF) is going to send us down because (Sonora has) a down year? Look at the wall. I'm not disrespecting La Cañada, but I'm not an at-large guy at all."
Bacon pointed to the wall behind left field, columns and columns of years painted on the wall to signify how many years Sonora has made the playoffs, won league championships and reached quarterfinals and semifinals. This entire season, Rio Hondo League coaches were concerned one team wouldn't make the playoffs. It was quite clear that team would be La Cañada after losing in the final stretch, though the Spartans did have a chance because of the new CIF rule. Staff writer Clay Fowler wrote in his Pasadena-Redlands East Valley report that effective this season, CIF is granting playoff berths to teams with a .500 or better record that finish one place out of automatic postseason position. Monrovia finished first, San Marino second, Temple City third and La Cañada fourth, respectively. I put in a call to San Marino coach Mack Paciorek and he could understand Bacon's argument.
"The whole season you're fighting to be in the top three to make the playoffs, and I can see how Bacon feels, that if they finished in one of the top three spots guaranteed for the playoffs why are they playing in a wild card round instead of the first round. At the same time, what if the situation was flipped. If I finished fourth, yeah, I would have hoped I got an at-large berth because it was obvious all four teams deserved to be in the playoffs."
Temple City lost Tuesday while La Cañada defeated South Torrance to advance to Thursday's first round vs. Anaheim at Glover Stadium. Bacon made it clear he holds no gripe over La Cañada but rather the system in which CIF now operates to select teams that get into the playoffs.
"(La Cañada) had a great season and deserved to be in the playoffs, but they didn't finish 1-2-3 in their league. I finished fourth one time in 1999 and I didn't get in the playoffs. I'm just kind of old school."
I played a little devil's advocate when interviewing Bacon. La Cañada helped make the Rio Hondo League an exciting season. They were certainly deserving of getting invited to the playoffs. After all, they won the Southern California Invitational and was in first place in the early part of league. But you can understand where Bacon is coming from, and he makes a good point: if you finish in the top three spots why are you essentially having to play in a "play-in" in the form of a wild card game to reach the first round?
On one hand, I'm glad La Cañada got in because of how exciting the Rio Hondo League turned out to be. Lets forget that it wasn't La Cañada that finished fourth. I would have rooted for Temple City and San Marino, too.
On the other hand, you have a situation where it's been the norm to only allow the top three teams in a 6-team league into the playoffs. If you didn't finish in the top three, tough. Try again next season and learn from not capitalizing key situations. Letting everyone play almost reminds me of Little League or T-Ball where everybody gets a trophy.
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Melendez worked as a correspondent for the San Gabriel Valley Tribune for three years and later landed a job as a freelance writer at the Los Angeles Times before accepting an offer at The Orange County Register covering high schools. Melendez covered Major League Soccer at The Register for three years before being promoted to report on the Lakers, Angels and Dodgers for the Web. Melendez also worked for the Daytona Beach News-Journal, Fresno Bee, Oakland Tribune and The Boston Globe. E-mail opinions, suggestions and tips to miguel.melendez@sgvn.com. |
Jeez, it's unusual to find such a great posting
I am little curious to know more about it.........
Great blog!! You should start many more. I love all the info provided. I will stay tuned :)
This has been an entertaining read. Gotta love Los Angeles. Some things never change.
This has been an entertaining read. Gotta love Los Angeles. Some things never change.
Bacon is a really big idiot and does not understand baseball. He should have not been hired as the coach. He should let someone else coach, class of 1997 was his biggest mistake. He let two guys that were great baseball players not even join the team, he thought they were no good. Fire bacon asap. Plus The current Jv coach is a far better coach.
Damm Deserts - If it's not Mojave, its Sonora.
If Sonora is so good, they may have been upset about having to play a formidable TC team...It's disappointing to have an article like this as the capstone to a good season.
I agree with egaleball...look at the Div. II bracket, it's horrible...They didn't even have a first round match-up due to Wild Card games...It's ridiculous. They also have 2nd place teams trying to get in to the first round. This is not little league. Everyone should not get a chance. In the real-world you get the job or you don't, you get into the college you wanted or you don't. It's called life.
Maybe CIF should use this as a teachable moment that they alwyas preach and tell the teams that didn't earn a 1-2-3 spot in their league better luck next year.
TC probably knew they were going to lose, and I'll bet Sonora wins that first round game over a weak #1 Victor Valley team.
I agree with egaleball...look at the Div. II bracket, it horrible...They didn't even have a first round match-up due to Wild Card games...It's ridiculous. They also have 2nd place teams trying to get in to the first round. This is not little league. Everyone should not get a chance. In the real-world you get the job or you don't, you get into the college you wanted or you don't. It's called life.
Maybe CIF should use this as a teachable moment that they alwyas preach and tell the teams that didn't earn a 1-2-3 spot in their league better luck next year.
TC probably knew they were going to lose, and I'll bet Sonora wins that first round game over a weak #1 Victor Valley team.
Bad draw... luck... nastly southpaw... whatever you want to call it, that's the game. Coach Bacon should check the D2 brackets if he thinks he got jammed (18 @large/play in games!)
sounds like sour grapes from Bacon. Just shut up and play, they got their shot and did not produce cuz they lost to a better team. dont whine about the draw they got.
I keep seeing comments regarding the RHL but they never say which league or leagues they are comparing it to?
The Star News covers Pasadena and the surrounding cities and I don't see any league that is better overall top to bottom.
If there is speak up an enlighten us all.
From what I have gathered, for maybe the first time in a couple of decades, TC did not have enough players to field both a freshman and a JV team. Then on to the season where they have an important player get excused for a couple games, followed by a public melt down in a key match up. The team winds up in an unaccustomed place, 3rd, and gets a bad draw for the first playoff game. With a predictable loss, their absolute top tier manager harps on errors and bemoans injuries, followed by this rant about the new CIF rules. This doesn't sound like the TC we are used to witnessing.
I didn't take it as Bacon was whining. I took it as somoene who just doesn't understand CIF - like every coach in every sport. CIF has a big book of policies, yet they make up stuff when they want. Why is it that some years there are at large births and why in some years there is not?
It used to be that the wild card rounds were for at large teams and for some leagues who get to send four teams to CIF because they are in a big league. Those teams would battle it out to bring the brackets to an even number. Now, it seems that the wild card rounds in some sports or some divisions is just an earlier round. There is no such thing as wild card. If CIF wants more teams in CIF then lets open it up to everyone who has an over 500 record and how ever many ronds that is...so be it.
Someone call the Waaambulance! Our opponent was too tough! You have got to be kidding me.
So if TC had finished 4th would they have NOT accepted an at large?
La Canada will lose in the next round anyway and so would TC. The Rio Hondo league is not that good. The only team with a chance is Monrovia if they get lucky but not likely. All will be gone soon.
No, he's just another frustrated LC Spartan because the coaches play their favorites over there. That's Josh Hanson on the far right, one of the best youth baseball players until he rode the bench for years at LC while Kendall played the underlings on JV and Ballard tucked in on varsity. You would be surprised how many young baseball players didn't go to LC because of the coaches there.
It is...
That guy second to the right looks like shia labeouf.