Baseball America College Podcast: Rewatching the 1995 CWS Championship

Image credit: (Photo courtesy of Cal State Fullerton)

On this episode of the Baseball America College Podcast, Teddy Cahill and Joe Healy debut a weekly podcast series centered around re-watching great college games from the past. 

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Today, the game is the 1995 College World Series championship game between Cal State Fullerton and Southern California. Fullerton scored an 11-5 win in this one to secure its third national title behind a standout performance from outfielder and closer Mark Kotsay. 

To help with the conversation, the hosts are joined by Ted Silva, who started that game for the Titans and is now an assistant coach at USC after coaching stops in a number of other places, including Nebraska from 2012 to 2019. 

Securing the win in the biggest game of the season was just the capper on what was already an outstanding season for Silva in 1995. He went 18-1 with a 2.83 ERA and 142 strikeouts in 152.2 innings of work. In addition to starting 19 games for the Titans, he also came on in relief in 10 others, earning six saves. At the end of the season, he was a 21st-round draft pick of the Rangers, which began a four-year run for Silva in affiliated minor league baseball. 

That success came after two years of working exclusively out of the bullpen for the Titans. In 1993 and 1994, Silva appeared in 65 games out of the bullpen, recording 20 saves along the way. 

On the podcast, Ted provides some of his most vivid memories from that championship game in particular and Fullerton’s entire run to the 1995 title more generally. 

Among the topics discussed are: 

• Augie Garrido’s Achilles injury that forced the legendary coach to sit on an electric scooter in the dugout
• The camaraderie of the 1995 Fullerton team 
• How easy Mark Kotsay made the game of baseball look at times
• The game plan for attacking a USC lineup that featured future big leaguers in Geoff Jenkins, Jacque Jones and Chad Moeller
• How he was able to settle into the game after giving up runs in the early innings and how his start against Stanford earlier in the CWS followed a similar path
• His impressions of some of USC’s younger talent on the 1995 team, including future Pac-12 strikeout leader Seth Etherton

Finally, Teddy and Joe wrap by discussing fast food and fast casual restaurants in depth. They discuss a 64-chain fast food bracket and Joe gives his long-anticipated review of In-N-Out after his trip to California earlier this month.