Dallimore longs for another shot in ‘bigs’

Nick Christensen

Friday, July 2, 2004 | 9:40 a.m.

Five times this year, a player on the Fresno Grizzlies' roster will return to his hometown.

The local paper will probably do a feature story on him and a TV station might come out and do a live shot. It's not that uncommon an occurrence.

But few players have the ties to the community that Fresno infielder Brian Dallimore does.

Dallimore, the son of 22-year UNLV baseball coach Fred Dallimore, returned home Thursday night, this time for the first time as a player with major league experience.

Back at Triple-A, he was 2-for-4 with one run in Fresno's 8-4 loss to the Las Vegas 51s on Thursday at Cashman Field.

In his eighth year of professional baseball, Dallimore finally got his chance at the major leagues when the San Francisco Giants called him up April 28.

"It was awesome," Dallimore said of his first major league start on April 30, when he went 3-for-3 and hit his first home run -- a grand slam. "To have that happen in the first game, it's really special. Obviously it's a dream come true. But it's great for anybody to have some success.

"It gives you a little confidence. You see it happen all the time. People don't get hits in a couple at bats, and they try too hard."

Overall, Dallimore, 30, has hit .250 in 12 games with the Giants. But he's become a yo-yo man for San Francisco, going down to Fresno, back up, and back down again after his initial major league appearance.

"You get used to trying to control what you can control," he said. "If you try and control things you can't control you'll wear yourself out, get down in confidence, beat yourself up.

"Last year, I would have given anything to be in this situation. If you would have told me in the offseason I would be in this situation, I would say I'd take it in a heartbeat."

Dallimore had been frustrated in the past by his inability to get a major leauge shot.

Last season with the Grizzlies, he hit .352 and was sound defensively, committing just 10 errors.

Dallimore was drafted in the ninth round of the 1996 draft by the Houston Astros after playing collegiately at Stanford.

Now back with the Grizzlies, Dallimore gets a chance to spend at least a few days at home in Las Vegas with his family.

"I wish everybody had an opportunity to do it. The season gets real long, coming back here and seeing people you know. That's fun. I'm thankful people want to see me play."