Magic Moment for Flores, Tragic Memory of Gardner

I don’t know anyone at USC who wasn’t pleased when pitcher Randy Flores broke the school record for victories, which he did Friday when he won his 41st game.

By all accounts, he’s an exceptional person as well as an exceptional college pitcher--a minister’s son from Pico Rivera who operates a charity baseball clinic out of his father’s church, a smart left-hander drafted by St. Louis in the 21st round last year who wisely decided to return for his senior year and a business administration degree.

Yet, Flores’ achievement also brought back tragic memories of another left-hander who held the record before him.

Bruce Gardner pitched at USC for three years, leaving in 1960 after his junior year with a 40-5 record to sign with the Dodgers for a $20,000 bonus. But he was drafted into the Army after a few games with the team’s Montreal farm club and injured his arm in a basic training accident.

Although he returned to the Dodger organization for three seasons, he wasn’t the same pitcher. He never received the call to Chavez Ravine.

On June 7, 1971, 11 years after he pitched his last college game, he was found dead between the pitcher’s mound and second base at Bovard Field, the campus stadium where he had starred.

Police said he shot himself with a .38-caliber revolver found in his left hand. Clutched in his right hand was his USC diploma. The plaque he won as the NCAA’s best pitcher of 1960 was a few feet away. He was 32.

Friends said he was bitter about his lost opportunity, believing he could have pitched in the major leagues if he had accepted a $50,000 offer from the Chicago White Sox after graduating from Fairfax High.

His former USC coach, Rod Dedeaux, said Monday he remembers Gardner as a well-rounded, well-liked college student.

“He was a dandy, that kid,” Dedeaux said. “I know he was disappointed because he didn’t have a major league career, but I don’t think he killed himself over it. I think he developed a mental illness.”

We’ll never know for sure. Dedeaux said Gardner was a talented pianist who also was actively involved in the campus theater. His favorite role was in the musical “Damn Yankees.” He played Joe Hardy, the man who traded his soul to the devil for a chance to play major league baseball.

*

Besides Tom Seaver, Randy Johnson and Bill Lee, USC has had a couple other pitchers who made names for themselves in the major leagues, though not as pitchers. . . .

Dave Kingman had an 11-4 record in one season for the Trojans. Mark McGwire was 7-5 in two. . . .

Two USC football players, cornerback Daylon McCutcheon and punter Jim Wren, have been named to Playboy’s preseason All-American team. . . .

A magazine you really should read for the articles, Sports Illustrated Women/Sport, was at newsstands for the first time Monday. . . .

Editor Sandy Bailey says readers shouldn’t anticipate a swimsuit issue. . . .

“I don’t think women are as interested in looking at scantily clad men as vice versa,” she says. . . .

That’s not what Buzz magazine writer Leila Cobo-Hanlon suggested last month in her preseason look at the Galaxy. . . .

It sounded like resignation in Mike Piazza’s voice when he said he still doesn’t see the Dodgers as a “bombs-away” team. . . .

Maybe it’s time for Bill Russell to return to a batting order with Piazza third, Eric Karros fourth and Raul Mondesi fifth. . . .

No matter how Del Harris tried to spin it when the Lakers drew Portland as their first-round playoff opponent instead of Phoenix, Robert Horry told it straight when he said, “We went from playing a gang of 6-3 guys to playing a gang of 6-10 guys.” . . .

If you’re one of 17,505 who has tickets for Game 1 of that series Friday night at the Forum, go early. Opening night across the street at Hollywood Park starts half an hour earlier at 7 p.m. The races drew 32,432 on that night last year. . . .

With a chance to beat Carl Lewis and the Santa Monica Track Club in the 400-meter relay Sunday at the Mt. SAC Relays, the HSI team dropped the baton. Last week, HSI’s Ato Boldon joked that the team’s initials stood for Handle Speed Intelligently. . . .

Vince Reel, still coaching track at Claremont-Mudd Scripps at 83, says he was the leader in five categories at his 65th high school reunion recently at Long Beach Wilson. . . .

“Most wives [three], youngest child [21], best hair, most recent operation [nine days] and . . . I can’t remember the other one.”

*

While waiting anxiously for Darrell Russell to write his book, I was thinking: break up the Cubs, Arvydas Sabonis vs. Keith Tkachuk would be a good matchup, I can’t remember the other one.