by MARK CAUL
The Lehman baseball team gives thanks to nearly 1,000 fans in attendance who witnessed the Lobos’ first-ever playoff game in program history. Despite being swept by Brehman, head coach Toby Robinson feels his team is on the right track heading into the future. (Photo by Jacob Torres)
It had just what you’d expect from a playoff atmosphere – students covered in paint, kids and adults cheering their lungs out and doting mothers and fathers beaming with pride.
The Lehman Lobos were about to make history on the field by playing in their first playoff baseball series at Texas State University.
As the Village People’s “YMCA” blared over the loudspeakers and the swelling crowd clapped and swayed along as the teams went through their pregame rituals, it was pretty evident that the stakes were a little bit higher than normal.
After a stirring rendition of the national anthem drew to a close and the teams were introduced by the announcer, the Lobos jogged out to their positions at cavernous Bobcat Field in San Marcos.
When the Lobos retired the first three Brenham batters for a relatively flawless top of the first inning, the Lehman fans were deafening.
“That’s about as loud as I think I’ve ever heard a crowd this season get when they retired us in order in that first inning,” Brenham head coach Jim Long said. “Their fans were definitely into the game at that point.”
At the bottom of the first inning, Lehman had something cooking as Cesar Ornelas singled and Tre Abeita walked to give the Lobos an opportunity to draw first blood.
But a couple of base-running errors kept the Lobos from pushing any runs across and Lehman seemed to struggle offensively from that point forward.
Despite the huge turnout of Lehman fans who made their presence known early, it didn’t take long for the fifth-ranked Cubs to flex their muscles and give the Lobos an initiation to playoff baseball.
A few innings later, it was relatively over.
Though his team ended up on the short end of a 14-2 romp in their very first post-season game, Lehman head coach Toby Robinson still couldn’t help but suppress a bit of a smile as his team basked in the adulation of the few hundred Lobo fans who gave them a nice ovation when the game ended.
“This was probably the most awesome thing I’ve ever been a part of in the five years I’ve been at Lehman,” Robinson said. “To be able to say we’re a playoff team after where this program began is pretty awesome. We wanted to be a little bit more competitive in this series obviously, but I think this shows our kids who will be coming back that this program is definitely headed in the right direction.”
Five years ago, the Lobo baseball team had to play every scheduled home game on the road because they didn’t have a field to call their own.
Three years later, Robinson and former coach Brock Rumfield were finally able to secure enough donations to break ground on a new baseball diamond last spring.
“The cool thing is—three of the seniors on this year’s team were a big part of helping this program get off the ground so it was very cool to see them be able to play in a playoff series in their last year,” said Robinson. “Through all the ups and downs, they stuck with it and it paid off for them.”
Tre Abeita, one of the three senior captains on this year’s team was excited to see the huge turnout for the Lobos.
“It was an amazing feeling to see all those fans in the stands cheering for us,” Abeita said. “It was definitely the biggest crowd I’ve played in front of. It made everything we went through these last four years worth it.”
Many of the fans in attendance, including Peter Ramirez, whose daughter Amy was a 2008 Lehman graduate, knew they were witnessing a landmark moment in Lehman athletic history.
“I heard about this game from some of my friends who still have kids that go to school at Lehman,” Ramirez said. “When my daughter was in school, there wasn’t a lot to cheer about here. But now Coach Robinson has these guys headed in the right direction. It was very nice to see how many people were lined up outside to get in here about an hour before the game, ready to cheer these guys on.”
There was a steady stream of positive cheers and chants as the game progressed even though things didn’t appear to be going Lehman’s way after the first inning.
When Brenham’s Erick Weiss blasted a two-run shot off of Lobo starting pitcher JP Flores to give Brenham a 2-0 lead, most of the stadium grew silent for a few minutes.
But a few minutes later, when members of the Lehman varsity football team began to file into the ballpark decked out in blue paint - the energy level quickly increased.
“It made me proud to see how much support those guys gave us tonight,” Robinson said. “It really meant a lot to my players.”
But a few hours later, the stadium emptied almost as quickly as it filled up. Some fans remained to simply bask in the glow of Lehman’s big night.
One of them was Norma Beltran, an aunt of one the Lobo JV players who was elevated to varsity for the playoff series. She held a game program in one hand and her ticket in the other.
“I’m keeping this program forever because it symbolizes all the hard work these kids and Coach Robinson have put in over the last few years,” Beltran said. “This is history and I couldn’t be prouder. And it won’t be the last time we get this far.”
