RB High Baseball Players Get Fired Up to Support Fired Coach

Players say recently fired Rancho Bernardo High School baseball coach Sam Blalock is usually calm on the outside, but fiery on the inside.

Now they're getting fired up for him.

"He's really not just a coach," said 16-year-old Matt Jervis, one of Blalock's players leading the charge to get the coach reinstated, even as district officials have yet to say exactly why the longtime coach was let go.

"He makes us into great men and not just great baseball players," the RB High junior said Monday at his family's home as he and his teammate, 17-year-old Gosuke Katoh, prepared to drop off more than 500 petition signatures at the Poway Unified School District office.

Blalock, the longtime coach who has led his teams to multiple championships, was fired Wednesday, though he said he did not know why and district officials have not yet explained.

Jervis said Blalock told the team about the firing on Wednesday, and the players immediately rallied behind the coach. On Thursday, about 40 players filled the PUSD office lobby waiting to speak to Superintendent John Collins, who they were told was not there. Instead, they spoke to an associate superintendent, who told them that the firing did not relate to money issues or an egregious rules violation but did not provide an exact reason, Jervis said.

"I don't think I'm the only one that boiled it down to a personal issue or something like that. We would know if he did something wrong," Jervis said, adding that he had spoken to Blalock since the firing and he was "devastated."

Katoh said Blalock means a lot to everyone on the team.

"I just think all of us look up to him as a coach and a fatherly figure," Katoh said.

Over the weekend, the district , with Collins asking for patience until more details are provided, and RB High Principal Paul Robinson, who told Blalock he was fired, saying the timing of the firing was "not the best."

District spokeswoman Sharon Raffer said Collins wasn't expected to meet with Blalock, who was reportedly out of town, until at least Tuesday.

But on Monday, Jervis and Katoh came to the district office hoping to speak to Collins themselves. They brought with them petition papers with more than 500 signatures from the community and students expressing support for Blalock. Raffer met the players in the office lobby and accepted the signatures, but said Collins was not there.

The players had been promoting the petition in-person and on a Facebook event page they created in the fired coach's honor, titled "Bring Back Blalock!!"

The petition reads, in part:

"He has been the face of Rancho Bernardo baseball with his 10 CIF titles and 784 victories. However these statistics are minuscule compared to the life lessons he teaches both on and off the field. He is a fatherly figure to many that we as players look up to highly."

The teens said they were hoping to speak to Collins but happy that they got to speak to someone. Later Monday night, they planned to paint a poster of support which they would hang on the coach's garage.

The players, and community members, are planning to turn out to the scheduled Dec. 12 PUSD school board meeting in support of their coach if the district does not reverse course on Blalock's firing.

One person determined to be there is Matt Jervis' mom, Michelle, who said anyone would be lucky to have Blalock coach their children.

"He's just the most amazing person and I cannot imagine what he's going through right now," Michelle Jervis said.

The baseball mom said she is proud of what her son is doing in support of his coach.

"Matt has not been himself, but I don't think I've ever seen him quite so focused on anything in his life," Michelle Jervis said. "To see him feel like he's got the capability to make a difference for the right, I'm like 'wow'. I knew he had it in him. I guess he's never gotten a chance.

"I don't think I've ever been more proud of him."

Michelle Jervis said she always worried, not that Blalock would be fired, but that he would decide to retire before her son had the chance to play under him.

"We all know he's going to retire someday ... but he deserves to say when that is," she said.

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