Long after the Chico State baseball team's 4-1 loss to Cal State East Bay marked the end of the 2015 season, Nick Padilla crouched behind home plate and caught pitches from a long line of little leaguers. Senior Day was also Little League day at Nettleton Stadium, so after signing autographs for hundreds of boys and girls, Padilla went out and played some ball with them.
He got beat up a little, blocking a bevy of balls bounced in front of home plate. But the joy the game brings made a few bumps and bruises along the way well worth his time.
Such was the story of Chico State's 2015.
Ranked No. 8 in the nation in the preseason, the Wildcats finished 18-25 overall and 17-23 in the California Collegiate Athletic Association. But the tears shed on this Senior Day sprung from the love of the game, not the disappointment that it delivered this season.
Chico State's 15 seniors were celebrated during pre-game ceremonies, each greeted with applause from their families, friends and some of the best college baseball fans found anywhere in the nation.
It felt like a victory in this last tangle at The Nett would mark a proper end. After all, many of those players had led the Wildcats to last season's College World Series. It was a group that most figured would eventually turn things around. But as the weekends rolled along, the 'Cats kept struggling.
Things never quite turned. Not even on the final day of the season.
Six senior pitchers combined on a seven-hitter. Robert Engels and Jace Puckett each threw two innings of scoreless relief and Robert Hook hurled a scoreless ninth. But outside of Tyler Madrid's leadoff double in the second, followed by Jeff Ortega's RBI-single, the offense could not get untracked, finishing the day with just five hits.
Reigning National Defensive Player of the Year Cody Slader and grinder second baseman Gordon Deacon provided two of the day's highlights on defense. Slader made a sensational stop and throw from his knees to cut down a runner at third in the eighth.
It was the last in a long line of memorable moments for arguably the best defensive player in the program's history.
Deacon robbed the Pioneers of a run in the eighth, diving far to his left to glove a hard grounder and then throwing the runner out at first.
In the ninth, after Ortega singled for the second time, Peter Miller entered the game as a pinch runner. The senior backstop – one of the best Chico State has ever had – missed most of the season after sustaining a broken wrist.
It was a great moment for a great young man.
Unfortunately the moment, the game and the season ended soon after with a double play, a moment of frustration to end a season of chalked full of them.
But Sunday was a day to see beyond all of that.
"Who is your favorite team?" Ortega asked one of the little leaguers who had lined up to get his signature. "You guys," said the young boy, pointing at him.
Expecting to hear Giants or A's or some other Major League squad, Ortega was taken by surprise. His reaction and smile said that it meant a lot.
Soon, most the boys and girls got in their cars to head home. Others ran the bases or stood proudly from the pitchers' slab.
Out in the bullpen beyond first base, the two longest-tenured Wildcats, Luke Barker and Ryan O'Shea, savored a few more minutes in uniform. It was not the season the senior pitchers dreamed of, but it is still the game they love. They wanted it to last, if even for just a few minutes longer.
It was not the season that Chico State fans dreamed of either. But Sunday they showed those 15 young men that they are loved for who they are, not just what they do. That feeling will last forever.
