July 16, 2001
Jim Livengood's Opening Statement:
"I'd just like to start off by thanking Jerry Stitt for his commitment to the UA and certainly to Wildcat baseball. Jerry will continue at the university in a yet to be determined position just so that you (the media) all know that and I think that's very important.
I'd also like to thank the search committee. I'd like to thank Gail Hopkins, Rocky LaRose, John Perrin and Joel Valdez. In a very tough, short time talked to a great number of candiadates and certainly came forward with four outstanding people. We're very, very lucky.
Now just to kind of talk about the kinds of things we were looking for in our new baseball coach. We definitely wanted a coach with head coaching experience, we wanted someone who had success at the national level, we wanted a coach that has great player relationships, pro scout relationships, academic importance, graduation rates, recruiting contacts regionally, locally and certainly nationally. We wanted someone with an understanding for the diversity of this university and respect for it.
Looking at those things, along with the ability to sell Wildcat baseball. Somebody that had a great amount of energy, a great amount of enthusiasm, certainly we wanted community involvement. That being said as we went down through certainly in my opinion the person that most closely fit all of that is the gentleman that I am sitting here with today. It is with a great deal of excitement, certainly for the University of Arizona, for Tucson, Wildcat athletics and especially for Wildcat baseball that I introduce to you our new head baseball coach for the University of Arizona, Andy Lopez. Andy, welcome to the Wildcats, we're glad you're here and we're excited about the future for this great program."
Andy Lopez's Opening Statement:
"I appreciate it. Again I want to express my gratitude to my wife. It's going to be 18 years of marriage coming on in September here real quick, we started along time ago in terms of coming to the University of Arizona when I was a baseball coach at Cal-State University-Dominguez Hills and my friendship with Coach Kindall goes way back - through his dramatic experience with his wife Georgia - and the friendship I have with he and Jerry Stitt and Jim Wing has been one of the most precious things I have in my coaching career and just in life. Those three gentleman are classy individuals, people that I admire. I am honored, truly honored, truly, truly humbled. I cannot express my gratitude enough for opportunity to be a part of this university. A part of what Coach Kindall, Coach Stitt and Coach Wing have developed. Again, I express my gratitude to President Likins, to Jim Livengood, to Rocky LaRose and the search committee.
In 1983 I traveled here with my wife and our recruiting budget was whatever was in my pocket at the time at Cal-State Dominguez Hills and Coach Kindall allowed us to be on their schedule on a February basis and I think we got beat about three-thousand-to-two that weekend in three games, I'm sure Coach Kindall set offensive records that weekend against a Division II program. I remember driving through the desert in a station wagon full of baseball players and my wife and I stopping at one of those truck stops, or something, to let the players eat some doughnuts - that was our per diem for that road trip - eat some doughnuts and get drink of water and turning to my wife after being absolutely destroyed in three games and saying to her `Boy that would be a great job one day', and never in my mind did I think I would sit in this position to be very candid and honest with you. I want to again express my gratitude and respect for Coach Stitt. We've talked numerous times over the last couple of weeks, but it really is a dream come true and I'm not one to hide from that feeling. I'm very, very thankful to be the head coach at the University of Arizona and we just hope that we will please the community, please the university and everybody associated with Wildcat baseball."
Coach Lopez on the potential hiring of Jerry Sttit as an assistant coach: I'm going to be very honest with you, I have some assistants that I have with me, obviously. I'm going to open those two positions. I'll talk to Jerry, but you know what when it all comes down to it, I want the best thing for Jerry Stitt and this program."
Coach Lopez on the returning roster: "I did speak with a couple of athletes last night. They were very excited, as I am. I'm not going to try and hide that. I know that we have a young staff coming back and I'm very, very comfortable working with a young staff. I did that at Pepperdine University. We recruited a bunch of young guys in 1989 and `90 and was crazy enough to talk to them about winning a national championship. I was the pitching coach there, as well as head coach, and we set a bunch of records in Omaha and won a national title. So I'm not discouraged by a young staff, and in some respects I kind of like it because they're still very workable. The don't have a lot of ingrained things that you have to work through. I know we've lost some key guys offensively, but we'll try to do our best to compensate in seeing the strengths of this particular club."
Coach Lopez on his coaching experience: "I've had an enriched experience, I went from Pepperdine, where we had to be a pitching, defense, small game type of club, to the Southeastern Conference where Skip Bertman revolutionized the SEC with the seven-run home run. I had to learn how to coach in that conference for seven years and beat LSU and Mississippi State and Alabama and Miami and Florida State and those people, and up until the last couple of years, when we had an unbelievable amount of injuries, we had winning records against those people."
Coach Lopez on the type of team he would like at Arizona: "I would like for us to be a hybrid type of club. I'd like to see us pitch very well, obviously, and be able to put some pressure on people defensively and offensively with team speed, but until they take away those aluminum bats, we're going to have to hit some home runs because that's the nature of college baseball these days."
Coach Lopez on revitalizing the Arizona program: "This is the third college program that I've been asked to come into and kind of get going again. That's not a knock on Jerry (Stitt), I love Jerry and we've talked about it. But obviously, my impression of Arizona, when I came here as a player at UCLA and when I came here as a coach at Dominguez Hills and Pepperdine, was a packed stadium, even for club like Dominguez Hills, but good crowds, and if you won you hoped to God that they didn't make you go back on the field again because you got your win and you wanted to get out of town. I know it's been a little down lately, and I don't mean that with any disrespect, those things happen, those turns in life occur, but again I would hope and pray that we do the right things all at the right time and go play for a national title very soon. And I mean that very sincerely. I've always asked players that I've recruited to be dumb enough to believe in the impossible. Please don't be so smart that you think yourselves out of things that can actually happen in life. I was dumb enough to go to Pepperdine and think we could win a national championship and we did. And quite honestly I thought we could have at Florida. For reasons that were beyond my control I didn't get a chance to accomplish that. But I pray that we'll be able to do that here at the University of Arizona."
Coach Lopez on getting crowd support at Sancet Field: "One of the things I shared with one of the young guys (an Arizona player) last night was that when I took the job at Florida, we were averaging about 800-900 people and three years later they had to expand the stadium. We were averaging 3,500 to 4,000 people. They had to put bleachers in left field because in one particular game against Florida State, we had beaten them three-out-of-four the previous year - never in the history of the University of Florida had that happened - and eliminated them in Omaha as well, and the following year the people were climbing the trees in the outfield to see the games because they couldn't get in. I know there's some time and some work and some energy (needed). I'm more than willing to go out in the community, allow them to see that, yes, I have faults, but I have one thing in my heart and that's to see good things happen to every athlete that comes in the baseball program at the University of Arizona. I want to see us be successful, because I know that's part of the self-esteem process of a young man. He wants to come in and know that he has a chance to play for a championship - conference, national championship - and get his degree and feel good about his time at this particular institution and I know that's part of the equation. We won't sacrifice their self esteem, we won't sacrifice their academics, we won't sacrifice who they are as individuals. Those that go to class, play hard, compete and represent their family and their university in a good way always have a good experience and I have a good experience with them. If we do that, then I think the community will understand that we're trying to put a good product on the field. One that will represent the city of Tucson, and the University of Arizona, but the city of Tucson in a real positive way. I just think the process will take place. I hope it does and I'm going to make every effort to have that accomplished."
Coach Lopez on setting a time frame for the program: "I stopped putting a time frame on things for one reason. I now understand that I can't control time. I was foolish when I was a little younger that you could control time. I will hope and pray that every day will be better and my dream is that one day we will be so good that we will stand on top of college baseball. But I honestly can't say there will be a time frame on that. I'm realistic, I honest with myself. I'll be very candid with you, I did not have any intentions on resigning my position at Florida because I thought we were successful. If you consider the injuries we had the last couple of years, I felt we were very successful. We'll continue to try and get better every single day both on and off the field. I have had the experience of having that goal and when that a goal is accomplished you have a chance to win the national championship. You get to Omaha. When you get to Omaha they are all very good teams and now you just have to catch a couple of breaks. I've been on both sides, I've caught some breaks where we won a national title and I've caught some breaks where we've gone in as the number one seed and we didn't win a national title. You need some breaks and hopefully we'll get those breaks along the way."
Coach Lopez on Arizona's tradition and history: "This is a great institution, this is a great - tremendous - baseball tradition. I told my wife I'm leaving an institution that in 90 something years of college baseball went to Omaha four times and I was in two of those visits. And now I'm coming to an institution that has three national championships to its resume and 14 visits, it's a pleasure and an honor and I'm humbled to be here."
