Chubb Tangaroa pitching for 1984 world championships

Press, 7 January 1983, Page 8

Chubb Tangaroa pitching for 1984 world championships

By

TIM DUNBAR

Mention the name Tangaroa in softball circles and the conversation will turn to speed pitching. Three Tangaroa brothers — Willie. Chubb, and Mae — play top softball, and they all pitch. The two younger boys. Chubb (aged 20) and Mac (aged 17), now play senior grade in Christchurch, but big brother. Willie, is back in their home town of Levin.

That is why Chubb Tangaroa who is head-and-shoul-ders above any other pitcher in Canterbury, will relish a particular engagement in the North Island early next month.

Tangaroa will make ’ his international debut for the second of two New Zealand teams in the mini-world series at Christchurch (January 28 to 30) and Hutt Valley (February 4 to 6). But it seems he is looking forward no more keenly to meet the softball stars of the United States. Canada, and Japan, than to the matches scheduled for the New Zealand squad during the break between the two rounds. The New Zealanders will head for Levin to play Horowhenua and Wellington and that presents the interesting prospect of Tangaroa v Tangaroa on the

pitching mounds for their respective teams. At the just completed Rothmans national championships in Dunedin where Canterbury had a shock second placing, pundits rated Tangaroa the No. 3 pitcher, behind only Wellington’s dynamic thrower. Michael White, and Auckland’s Steve Jackson. He wasn’t always a pitcher though, in a softball career which began in Levin, at the tender age of five. “I started off at short-stop, went to first base . . .and then into pitching." said Tangaroa this week on his return from the nationals. "Back in schooldays everyone wanted to pitch" One of his regrets now on looking back on his days at Waiopehu College, a co-edu-cational school, is that the national secondary schools tournament didn’t exist at the time. “We had a good side then,” he recalled. Sometime back in those early Levin days Robert Tangaroa, as his birth certificate would have it had the name of “Chubb" bestowed upon him. The man himself says he does not know how he ended up with that name. “You’d have to ask my mother and

father. I've had the name since I was a tiny tot.” “Just about everyone knows me as Chubb. If I was walking down the street and someone said ’Rob’ I’d keep walking." Tangaroa has represented Canterbury at three New Zealand Championships now, and for four seasons, since he moved south, hundreds of club batters have been swishing aimlessly at speed deliveries with movement that is both late and prodigious. Last season he had chalked up 189 strike-outs before Christmas; this season it w r as another big tally — 172 “Ks” in the same period. But up until last Sunday he had no recognition at the national level in spite of the attention he grabbed at the previous Rothmans touranment with 19 “Ks" on the first day — against the mighty Wellington and Hutt Valley. This season his chances looked a little dim when his Burnside and Canterbury catcher, John Daly, injured his back just three weeks before the nationals and was restricted to a “DH” batting

role in Dunedin.

As well as honing their highly-regarded pitchercatclier combination Tangaroa and Daly, himself a national team prospect, had been training together. “We were playing squash and lifting weights. I was hoping that he would be there."

Tangaroa’s build-up was also hindered by the two illfated tournaments Noel Leeming Burnside has entered this season. "We went to Dunedin and it was rained out. Then we went to the Cowans (in Hutt Valley) and that was rained out. It left a hole in the wall.” At the Rothmans the vital catcher’s role had to be filled by the Canterbury captain. Graeme Anderson, a specialist first baseman. But Anderson an experienced ball player, rose to the occasion. “They were hard games, but it helped once we got to know the batters and their weakenesses,” Tangaroa said. “Graeme caught really w’ell. It made my job easier.” The young pitcher said that he relied on movement and variations of pace to put the ball past the big batters

of the North. “We mixed it right around. Some batters got on to them and some didn’t. The field did really well, too.”

With Tangaroa the only Canterbury specialist pitcher (though the Hall brothers, Alan and Jimmy, gave some relief) there was a big load on his shoulders in the 11 games the team played. “1 had to pace myself. I got tired after a while and was feeling the strain over the last few games.” In the final, something few observers would have expected Canterbury to reach, the title-holder, Wellington got the jump with four runs in the first innings after a nervous Tangaroa sprayed the ball around. “I don’t know what happened there .. .” Tangaroa shrugged.

That understandable lapse notwithstanding, Tangaroa had what the Canterbury team manager, Mr Leon Fife, termed “an outstanding tournament. He was beating the best and deserved to get in the New Zealand teams.” A 1-0 shut-out win over Auckland (unbeaten in the round-robin) got Canterbury into the final, but Tangaroa considered his best pitching performance was the 3-2 victory over Hutt Valley which,

in the end ensured it a place in the top four play-offs. “That was the game." Tangaroa said. “Everything clicked and the batting went well (including, of course, two automatic home runs by Jimmy Hall)."

Tangaroa’s undoubted talents were acknowledged by the national selector’s (Messrs Mike Walsh, convener, John Leeney, and Merv Clyma) when they named him along with Loren Algar and Peter Roberts as the three pitchers in the New Zealand B team for the miniseries. White and Jackson were the sole A team pitchers selected.

At this stage the 20-year-old has no fear of the powerful North America batters he will have to face in three weeks time. “We haven’t heard anything about them, you don't really know what they'll be like. I'm not too worried at the moment, but I'll probably get nervous when it comes round to it."

His development as a pitcher had its first big boost. Tangaroa says, when he moved south. “Coming down from Horowhenua to here was a big jump. In a stronger union you must improve.”

The second stage of his development was during the 1981 northern summer when he signed a pitching contract with the Long Beach Nitehawks team in California. “Going over to the States really helped,” Tangaroa said. “There were five of us pitching and I was learning off the others. I came right. You’d have about 10 games in a tournament.”

Tangaroa has no illusions about his own ability, and says White has to be No. 1 in New Zealand at the moment. “He's spotting the ball really well."

And it dosen’t worry him too much if the tag of top dog in the New Zealand pitching standings eludes him.

“As long as I get to the world champs in 1984 I’ll be happy — even if they take three or four pitchers."

Selection in one of the New Zealand teams for the forthcoming home series had been Tangaroa’s initial goal, but he sees it chiefly as a means for getting “good experiences" in the build-up for that 1984 world series in Midland, Michigan. "That’s my aim now."