Every February, the focus is on Valentine’s Day, candy hearts, passion and all that lovey-dovey stuff.
But let’s not forget about a more violent occurrence that begins every February and lasts until June — a harrowing occurrence that invariably commences with a slaughter.
We are, of course, discussing the beginning of the ASU baseball season.
Calling what ASU does to opposing baseball teams “wins” and “blowouts” during the early portions of the season doesn’t quite do justice to just how dominating the baseball team is.
Last weekend, ASU defeated Northern Illinois 26-1. That is not a typo. Twenty-six runs. And the Sun Devils did it in only seven innings.
Scores like this are not uncommon for the baseball team.
In 2009, the Sun Devils won games by scores of 20-3 (against UA), 15-0, 14-1 and 23-9 (also against UA).
Those scores are just ridiculous, and the Sun Devils have also had their fair share of games where the differential was at least eight runs. In fact, there are too many to count.
You get the point.
Unfortunately, basketball and football get most of the attention, and have for some time. While some of the lack of attention to the baseball team is due to stadium sizes, (football seats about 77,000 fans while baseball only seats about 4,000), there really is no justification for the Sun Devil baseball program to be receiving less attention on campus than our mediocre-at-best football team.
Heck, ASU baseball games are even free for students.
Would you rather pay $129 yearly to watch our football team lose and fail to generate an offense, or would you rather see the baseball team destroy all-comers and not spend a cent?
It’s not a hard decision.
If ASU football and basketball’s awards and honors were combined, they wouldn’t come close to baseball’s long list of achievements.
The baseball team has won five national championships, third all-time among NCAA baseball programs.
The team has 21 College World Series appearances, tied for second all-time.
ASU has won 61 CWS games, third all-time, and it hasn’t had a losing season since 1985.
Forget just having a winning record. ASU has finished at least 15 games over .500 every year since 1996.
The Sun Devils have finished in the Top 10 in five of the last seven seasons, and haven’t finished a season outside the Top 25 since 1995.
There really aren’t enough numbers or adjectives to describe just how dominant the ASU baseball program is, both historically and presently.
The team has won the last three Pac-10 titles, is the favorite to win the Pac-10 again and features former high school and junior college All-Americans at every position.
So no matter how bad football or basketball may be in any given season, take solace in the fact that once the calendar turns to February, the annual slaughter that is ASU baseball pounding other teams into submission is about to commence.
So get out to Packard Stadium and watch the baseball team outscore the football team. For free.
