Sage Hill’s home run hitter: Bock

Even in high school baseball, Conner Bock found out that you have to negotiate a little bit to retrieve a memorable home run ball.

He left all the dealing up to an adult. Trying to find Bock’s game-winning two-run shot in the eighth that led Sage Hill School to a dramatic win on Tuesday took some work.

“I saw some parents over there looking for [the home run ball],” Bock said after Sage Hill rallied for a 5-2 win at Arcadia Rio Hondo Prep in the second round of the CIF Southern Section Division 6 playoffs. “If they got it, great. If not, it’s whatever. We got the [win].”

After the extra-inning affair, the father of one of Bock’s teammates handed Bock a ball, telling him it was the home run ball. Rich Tait is the man who went searching for the ball, and with the help of a stranger, he came up with the memento for Bock.

To this day, Bock isn’t quite sure if the ball is the one he blasted over the right-field fence. The story and ball doesn’t add up to Bock.

“I’m still not sure the real story about it because I hit the ball and it cleared over the fence and through another fence and onto a golf course,” Bock said. “The story is that a golfer threw it over, but it didn’t make it all the way, so someone had to pay a homeless man to go get the ball that was in like some ravine between the field and the golf course.

“[The homeless man] threw back this rubber ball. I don’t know if that was the ball or [that my dad] got a new ball. I don’t know which is the real ball. The ball, it still resembles the hit and it’s just as good for me.”

The rubber ball set Cole Tait’s dad $5 back, and the rubber ball, not the one Dave Bock gave his son, is on Bock’s desk in his bedroom at home. The rubber ball is priceless to Bock, who seemed to have many valuable plate appearances for the Lightning in the postseason.

In three playoff games, the big left-handed hitter batted .500 with a home run, a double and six runs batted in, to go with three stolen bases and two runs, lifting Sage Hill to the quarterfinals for the first time in five years. With a runner in scoring position, the junior drove in a run every time, except for two instances.

“He’s been our top offensive player since his freshman year,” Sage Hill Coach Dominic Campeau said of Bock. “He’s the guy who drives our offense. I tell the guys all the time that we got to find a way to get on base for King Kong to come and hit. We battle, we get on base, and we hope he’s going to hit a ball in the gap or hit it out.”

Six times Bock belted home runs this year, splitting them at home and on the road. The 6-foot-2, 195-pounder led Sage Hill hitters with a minimum of 50 at-bats in practically every offensive category, home runs, batting average (.333), RBIs (34), hits (26), triples (four), runs (31), on-base percentage (.481) and slugging percentage (.717).

Bock also pitched for Sage Hill. While he doesn’t see himself as a pitcher, Bock did whatever Campeau asked of him and posted solid numbers. Bock went 4-3 with a 2.37 earned-run average with 47 strikeouts in 38 1/3 innings.

The best outing by Bock came on May 1 in a 3-1 win at home against Crean Lutheran that ended the Saints’ two-year run as Academy League champions. The southpaw threw 4 1/3 innings, allowing one run and three hits, while striking out six to clinch Sage Hill’s first league title in six years.

While Sage Hill won all 12 games in league to produce its first undefeated crown, the one prize it fell short in claiming was its first section championship. Sherman Oaks Buckley ended Bock’s season in the quarterfinals, overcoming a 4-0 deficit on the road in the top of the seventh by scoring seven runs in its last at-bat to stun the top-seeded Lightning, 7-5, on Friday.

“We were cruising [through the first six innings],” Campeau said, “but since the first playoff game, it seems like offensively we were not really clicking. We just did enough to score runs, but we never had that big inning like we had all year.”

The most runs Sage Hill managed to score in an inning in the postseason was three in the eighth in the second round. Two of those runs came on one swing of the bat by Bock, who extended Sage Hill’s season.

Bock pulled it off by taking 6-foot-9 lefty Sampson Sly-Hoar deep. The starter fell behind 2-0, and then he tried to blow a fastball right by Bock, who expected the pitch and broke a 2-2 tie with arguably his hardest hit ball of the season.

“He pitched the game before that,” Bock said of Sly-Hoar, who had gone four innings in his start during Rio Hondo Prep’s 9-0 win at Panorama City St. Genevieve in the first round. “He was burned [out]. We were hoping to get the best of him before they put in their relievers.”

Bock’s home run ended Sly-Hoar’s day and allowed Sage Hill (20-7) to tie a single-season record for overall wins.

All that was missing afterward was Bock’s home run ball. At first, Bock played it off as if he didn’t care much about the ball.

“Conner’s like, ‘I don’t want that ball. It’s not like it’s my first home run ever,’” Campeau said.

After finding out how much effort everyone put in to get the supposed ball, Bock appreciated it.

“We were never able to find the ball,” Rich Tait said. “We figured it went into the storm drain. Then there was a homeless guy who is walking through the [wash, behind the right-field fence], and I yelled down at him, because you couldn’t see because the site was obscured. I ask him, ‘Hey! Do you see a baseball down there?’ He was like, ‘Yup, I see it.’ I said, ‘Well, I’ll give you $5 if you can toss it up to me.’ He was like, ‘Yeah, sure.’ He tosses the ball up, but it’s like one of those crappy old practice balls, one of those pitching machine balls.

“Obviously, it wasn’t the home run ball, but I paid him the $5 anyway. I gave the ball to Conner, telling him it was his home run, but I don’t think he believed it.”

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Conner Bock

Born: Aug. 2, 1997

Hometown: Newport Coast

Height: 6-foot-2

Weight: 195 pounds

Year: Junior

Coach: Dominic Campeau

Favorite food: Double-double from In-N-Out Burger

Favorite movie: “Good Will Hunting”

Favorite athletic moment: Hitting a game-winning two-run home run in the eighth inning to lift Sage Hill to a 5-2 win at Arcadia Rio Hondo Prep in the second round of the CIF Southern Section Division 6 playoffs.

Week in review: Bock hit .500 with a home run, a double and six runs batted in, to go with three stolen bases and two runs, lifting Sage Hill to the quarterfinals of the CIF Southern Section Division 6 playoffs.