Serra graduate Marcus Pointer is moving on up coaching ranks with Duluth Huskies

When his longtime friend and coaching partner Tyger Pederson stepped down as Duluth’s manager prior to the summer of 2019, Pointer got the call, taking over as skipper of the Huskies.

“[Pederson and I] had a close relationship … but he had a phenomenal opportunity to get himself into affiliated baseball,” Pointer said. “And he felt like I was a good fit to take charge after he was gone to continue on the path that we started to build.”

Now, Pointer has corralled something of a Bay Area Northwest. In addition to carrying three county players on the Huskies roster — pitchers Michael Sarhatt (Skyline College) and Richard Kiel (Menlo College), and third baseman Dom Meza (Serra and Cañada) — Pointer also brought aboard his staff one of his former players from Cañada, hitting coach Chris Miguel.

“If you asked me at that point of time (while playing at Cañada) … no, I wasn’t even thinking of [coaching],” Miguel said. “I was thinking of playing pro baseball at that point … but things didn’t pan out. And I started thinking my junior or senior year … I’m probably going to get straight into coaching. And that was the case.”

Despite a sub-.500 record in Northwoods League play, the Huskies are sitting pretty in the Great Plains East Division standings.

Duluth is currently in second place in the division. And while each of the league’s four divisions send two teams to the postseason — the champions of each the season’s first half and the second half — the Waterloo Bucks, winners of the first half, have already clinched the second-half championship in the Great Plains East, meaning the second-half playoff bid falls to the second-place team.

“We’re in a position where, if the season ended today, we would be in the playoffs,” Pointer said prior to Tuesday’s 5-0 victory over the Willmar Stingers. “So, we’ve got to hold on … and if we hold our position, we’re going to get in.”

The Huskies currently hold a one-game lead over the Eau Claire Express and the La Crosse Loggers (tied for third) with the regular season ending Saturday.

Networking is the name of the game in summer leagues, and Pointer’s current position is a prime example of how fate can hinge on the it’s-who-you-know rule. After an All-American community college career at Skyline, Pointer transferred to University of the Pacific, where he played with Tyger Pederson, the older brother of Atlanta Braves slugger Joc Pederson.

Some years later, while attending a Stanford game at Sunken Diamond in 2017, Pointer ran into the Pedersons’ father, Stu, who was readying a staff in the Alaska Baseball League. Tyger Pederson had already been slotted as a coach with the Glacier Pilots, and Pointer was offered a job to join his former college teammate on the staff.

“Honestly, yeah, it’s a big coaching network where a lot of four-year schools, they will reach out and try to place players,” Pointer said. “And it’s kind of luck of the draw to who you know and how well you know coaches. … So, it’s important to network and get out and talk to as many people as you can.”

Kiel landed on the Huskies’ staff in a similar fashion.

The 6-6 right-hander had originally taken a spot on roster in the MINK Summer College Baseball League with the Nevada Griffons in Nevada, Missouri. At the outset of the summer, however, the Griffons had their season canceled due to positive COVID tests in their organization. Nevada assistant coach Brian Daly had an in with Pointer’s staff, however, and in working to get his Griffons players placed elsewhere, found Kiel a summer home in Duluth.

“He drove from Missouri the same day and he got up here,” Pointer said of the Australian native Kiel. “And I think he threw the next day, and got a zero, it was a big zero. And with his accent and everything … he instantly became a big part of the team.”

Pointer — who hails from Pacifica — is set to return as Skyline’s pitching coach in 2022.

After winning the 2018 California Collegiate League championship as an assistant coach with the Orange County Riptide, Pointer is looking to ride the wave of the Lake Superior North Shore as far as he can with the Huskies.

“There’s a hunger there to kind of get into the playoffs and win it because some of these guys have been here since May 28,” Pointer said. “So, to get this close and have a shot, it means everything to have a chance to get in.”