Roadtrip: Forced or deserved?

Vagt said he was told by Dilley, Lenny, you lied to me. … You will never use the field again.

Dilley declined to comment on the allegations, other than to say, No one is going to be able to use the field. It's a construction zone.

Dilley did say that the contractor working on the new football and baseball field renovations had to make changes to allow the completion of the baseball season. Now that the school year is over, the contractor began demolition of the football seating, leaving no safe way for people to access the baseball field.

Did Vagt lie? Is Dilley being vindictive?

It's hard to say. According to Commission on Athletics, the governing body of community college sports in the state, there is to be no out-of-season competition played by teams associated with the school. Any school caught violating this rule is subject to punishment.

The Longhorns, and their various name changes, appear to have skirted this issue, but not by much. In their previous lives as the San Mateo Bulldogs and Dawgs, the team used the same colors, logo and the facilities of CSM which would seem to be in violation of the rules. Two years ago, Vagt said he was told by Dilley that he needed to change the name and colors and anything else that tied the summer team to the school. Vagt said he could not do it immediately because of monetary considerations. Vagt went to Dilley last year and told him that he had changed the name to the Condors but apparently that was for home games only. They were still referred to as the Bulldogs or Dawgs on the road which leads one to believe that Vagt was not entirely truthful about making the changes.

This season, Vagt told Dilley that the name, color and everything else had been changed to the Longhorns at which point Dilley allegedly told Vagt he couldn't use the facilities.

Vagt said the blue-and-white of CSM runs through his veins.

I graduated from CSM. I was student body president, student senator when I was there, Vagt said. [Dilley] can take the name from me but I will always be a Bulldog.

The Lounge feels for both sides and can understand where both sides are coming from. I can understand the monetary ramifications for Vagt and the team. He has spent $6,000 on the changes not only to disassociate the team from CSM but money had to be paid to the league the Longhorns play for the changes made. Vagt then had to pass those costs along to the players. There have always been costs associated with the team that the players pay, but those costs went up this year because of the changes and the traveling the team must do this summer.

I can also understand if Dilley is a little miffed. If Vagt was not completely truthful, there has to be some kind of punishment. If Dilley really did say those things to Vagt, it would be understandable. When someone tells you one thing, you take them at their word. When you find out that it was not the complete truth, it's understandable to be upset.

It's not as if Vagt is a stranger to CSM or Dilley. Vagt handles all the announcing duties and between-inning music for all of CSM's home baseball games and has been associated with the CSM baseball program for years. It's not to wise to bite the hand that feeds you, so to speak.

The people really affected by this alleged controversy are the players and their families. With all 45 games of the season on the road, it requires more money and time for everyone involved.

But Dilley shouldn't be blamed. He has bent over backward to help local athletics. CSM has been a valuable resource to Peninsula high school athletics. Various local high schools have used CSM's pool while their pool is being renovated or replaced. The gym was used for Serra's Northern California semifinal game against Newark Memorial. CSM has not asked for anything in return. If he put his foot down on this issue, it should be accepted and a search should begin for the next-best solution. I don't know if this was possible, but maybe the baseball team should have suspended operations for a season to get everything straightened out. If it was done two years ago, this wouldn't be a situation now.

There are dozens of regulation-sized baseball fields scattered around the Peninsula and while field space is tight, not one city park and recreation department was willing to help the Longhorns out? Granted, the facilities may not be as nice or as luxurious as the CSM facilities, but isn't the whole point to just play baseball?

Dilley was willing to say he feels that organized sports are getting out of hand. He said when he was in school, kids would go out and play pickup games basketball, football, whatever.

Generations (of kids) now have to have everything organized, Dilley said. It keeps kids from participating in other sports.

College sports is a bit of a different animal, where specialization in one sport is almost mandatory to have a shot at scholarship to a four-year school. There are less choices for college players to choose from and if they want to keep their skills honed and have a shot at playing at the next level, they need to play almost year 'round.

But there are options out there. There are wood-bat leagues, semi-pro leagues. And if worse comes to worse, you pack up your equipment and go to where the games are.

If both Vagt and Dilley are in the business of turning young college men into upstanding adults in the community, what better example to show the players than to work out the differences between them? Get together, flesh everything out, find out where communication broke down and the best way to go about resolving the problems and re-establishing a rapport between the two.

It's something everyone needs to deal with in every-day life, not just in sports.

Nathan Mollat can be reached by e-mail: nathan@smdailyjournal.com or by phone: (650) 344-5200 ext. 102. What do you think of this column? Send a letter to the editor: letters@smdailyjournal.com.