This year Ridgeview High School’s baseball team is thriving with a fairly young but very skilled team. Learning how to persevere through a sport based around failure together is bringing them closer and closer by the day.
Senior, Benjamin Castro has been playing baseball for 13 years. Professional MLB player Manny Ramirez inspired him to continue in the sport. According to Castro, “He was my favorite baseball player growing up.” His motivation in baseball from his desire to perform well in the sport. A few strengths he believes that he has in baseball are pitching and hitting. “I like hitting so that’s really what I work on a lot.” Castro describes his team’s camaraderie as very good. He believes the toughest opponent of the season this year will be Bakersfield Christian High School because they are a really good school and he believes they are going to be great competition. From his perspective in order to beat Bakersfield Christian they will have to keep practicing and getting better day by day until the time comes.
Also Junior, Adrian Bravo has been playing baseball for five years. According to Bravo, “ My mom and my dad helped me find the love for the sport.” His parents were a big inspiration for him while playing the sport. His motivation comes from the competitiveness the sport has. “It just really keeps me going.” He describes his favorite part about baseball as being around his teammates and the good energy and culture the team brings. Bravo also believes that Bakersfield Christian will be their toughest opponent of the season because they are usually always one of the better teams. From his perspective in order to beat their toughest opponent the team needs to use every game before to prepare. One goal that Bravo has for baseball is to become a really good pitcher and get an offer from CSUB. In order to accomplish this goal is working hard every single day and having a good attitude.
Baseball coach Robert Shahan has been coaching at Ridgeview for 15 years. His favorite part about coaching baseball is the uniqueness of the game. According to Shahan, “Baseball is a uniquely frustrating game…really the best players are people that deal with adversity well.” He believes failure is a big part of the game. The best piece of advice that he has received as a coach is, “Tomorrow is a new day”. This advice inspired the idea that the most important thing is to wake up the next day ready to attack. The difference between last year’s season and this year’s season is that last year the team was very successful because the team was very experienced seeing as a lot of the team was seniors, however this year there are a lot more inexperienced players. According to Shahan, “We have a lot of guys who are new to the varsity level and there is going to be growing pains.” With that said he believes that this year’s team is easily the most talented that they have ever had. Lastly, according to coach Shahan, “I think our team is great… The only thing that we need is more of Ridgeviews community to come to the games and support us and be part of the energy we got going on out there.”
Overall, Ridgview’s baseball team is set up to have a great season. With a very strong bond and willpower they are ready to take on all challenges.
