Columnist Ron Kantowski: The boys of winter are blowing hot air

Friday, Jan. 14, 2005 | 10:04 a.m.

Ron Kantowski is a Las Vegas Sun sports writer. Reach him at ron@lasvegassun.com or (702) 259-4088.

All those Big Ten coaches who think moving the start of the college baseball season back to March 1 is going to level the playing field against the warm weather schools have been spending too much time in the Hot Stove League.

The average temperature in East Lansing, Mich., in February, when most good college baseball teams begin their seasons, is 23.7 degrees. The average temperature in East Lansing in March, when the Big Ten coaches and their Rust Belt coaching compadres apparently have convinced the NCAA that its baseball season should begin, is 33.7 degrees.

If that's baseball weather, then why do the Tigers spend March down in Lakeland, Fla.?

That's why this new proposal for college baseball to adhere to a uniform schedule that would begin March 1, with practice beginning Feb. 1, makes about as much sense as having Sammy Sosa lay down a sacrifice bunt at Wrigley Field with the wind blowing out.

In a report made Monday at the NCAA convention, the Division I Baseball Issues Committee said a uniform calendar would address some "competitive equality questions."

It's not fair, say the Big Ten coaches, that Florida and Texas and Arizona State are hitting fungoes while Michigan State and Ohio State are shoveling snow off the infield.

You know, in a perfect world, it probably isn't fair. But as noted above, this is one band-aid that isn't going to stop the bleeding. A better solution might be for the Big Ten schools to take some of that BCS money and catch a Southwest Airlines super saver to Las Vegas.

"We could play right now," UNLV coach Buddy Gouldsmith said Thursday. "It's a beautiful day."

Naturally, you wouldn't expect Gouldsmith to be willing to give up what little competitive edge he has over the Big Ten. The argument for changing the rules is that 63 percent of the NCAA's baseball schools are situated north of some imaginary line that divides the halter top schools from the frozen tobacco spit schools.

In that Champaign-Urbana, Ill., and Bloomington, Ind., are the Big Ten's two most southern schools, I'll bet that line was drawn just a little south of Interstate 70.

"I wanna say St. Louis," Gouldsmith said.

Close enough.

Gouldsmith said pushing back the start of the season would be just one more concession to the schools back East. Just add it to the American East Conference's automatic bid to the NCAA tournament, he says.

"You look at last year, where there were four or five teams from the state of New York in the tournament," he said. "You're certainly not going to convince me that anybody in New York playing baseball should get an automatic berth."

Even if St. John's did beat the Rebels 9-6 to eliminate the Rebels from last year's regional at Stanford.

But Gouldsmith said if the proposal is ratified -- it can't be considered by the NCAA Management Council until next January, which means the earliest it could be implemented is the 2007 season -- he'd just as soon it would happen now.

That would give the warm weather schools more time to adjust their schedules, which is going to be a major hassle and perhaps the biggest worm in a big can of them, should the start of the season be pushed back.

Provided the 56-game schedule isn't shortened, the College World Series would end in July three times from 2007-2011. With the school year ending two months earlier on most campuses, the expense to house and feed baseball players would increase.

Gouldsmith said by starting the season a month later -- the Rebels this year open Feb. 4 against Cal State Northridge at Wilson Stadium -- it will do away with four weekends on which to schedule and play games. That will mean more midweek games, which will mean more missed classes.

Plus, by narrowing the gap between the start of the college season and the start of the big league season, the college teams will have a shorter window when they're the only game in town. I mean, who's going to sit on a blanket to watch USC play Stanford when the Dodgers and Giants are playing ball just up the road?

Part of college baseball's charm is the quirk of nature -- in this case, a literal one -- that has produced a scenario where somebody like Michigan aspires to be Cal State Fullerton.

Maybe it's not a perfect world, but it's one I can live with on the Road to Omaha.