Former Big Leaguer Helped ASU To 1987 CWS

Mike Benjamin

Benjamin joins Travis Jewett and Ken Knutson on Esmay’s coaching staff for the 2010 season.

“We are very excited for Mike Benjamin to come back and once again be a part of the ASU baseball program,” Esmay said. “Mike was a student-athlete at Arizona State, went on to have a successful pro career, and now he is looking forward to returning to ASU and help continue the winning tradition.”

Benjamin played shortstop for the Sun Devils in 1986 and 1987, earning First Team All-American and First Team All-Pac-10 honors in 1987. He hit .315 in his ASU career, including .327 with 18 homers and 55 RBI during the ’87 season. Benjamin also stole 30 bases, helping lead the Sun Devils to Omaha and the College World Series that year. He was a third round pick of the San Francisco Giants in the 1987 MLB Draft, playing 13 seasons in the majors. He played with the Giants for seven years before playing with the Philadelphia Phillies, Boston Red Sox and Pittsburgh Pirates.

Esmay and Benjamin were teammates at Arizona State during the 1986 season, followed by Esmay joining head coach Jim Brock’s staff as an assistant during Benjamin’s final season with ASU in 1987.

(Release)

ASU Assistant Spent 17 Seasons As Washington Head Coach

Knutson

record in Pac-10 play. He is Washington’s all-time leader in coaching victories and won four Pac-10 Northern Division titles and two overall Pac-10 titles during his tenure. He led the Huskies to six NCAA Tournaments and was three times named the Pac-10 Coach of the Year (1996, 1997 and 1998).

Knutson coached 31 All-Americans at Washington, including 2006 Golden Spikes Award winner and current San Francisco Giant Tim Lincecum, as well as closers Will Fenton and Buck Merrick. Merrick is the school’s all-time leader in saves with 31, while Fenton is second with 23, including the 2003 season where he did not allow a run while recording 12 saves. While at Washington, Knutson spent much of his head coaching career as the UW’s pitching coach, coaching at least one All-Pac-10 pitcher every year he served in that capacity.

Prior to being named Washington’s head coach in 1993, Knutson spent nine seasons with the Huskies as both a player and an assistant. In 1981, the lefty Knutson compiled a 5-2 record with a 2.89 ERA, helping lead Washington to the Pac-10 Northern Division title, their first since 1959. He was a First Team All-Pac-10 selection that season after transferring from Seattle University, where he was an all-league performer.

From 1982 to 1986, Knutson was in charge of the Husky pitching staff, including the 1985 season when UW led the nation with a 2.80 ERA. After coaching semi-pro ball in the Seattle area, Knutson returned to Washington as the lead assistant coach and pitching coach from 1990 to 1992 before being named head coach.

(Release)

The Plot Continues To Thicken In The Wake Of Pat Murphy’s Departure

Lisa Love (ASU photo)

The report says ASU officials received a “notice of allegations” from the NCAA on Nov. 19, which was the day before the school announced head coach Pat Murphy’s resignation.  Murphy spoke for the first time over the weekend and told the Republic that he was fired without cause.

ASU Vice President For Athletics, Lisa Love, denied at that time that Murphy’s “resignation” was connected to an ongoing two year NCAA investigation into the Sun Devil baseball program.

The notice from the NCAA to ASU reads “It is alleged that the institution violated the principles of institutional control in that it failed to ensure adequate systems to monitor for compliance and provide adequate NCAA rules education involving the baseball program and student athletes.”

Pat Murphy

A decision from the NCAA on the matter is not expected to made until sometime around the end of the 2010 college baseball season at the earliest.

As we have mentioned twice before on this site, the NCAA has never made any mention of Murphy on The Record on NCAA.org.  The Record is the section of the web site where coaching hirings, firings, resignations, retirements and the like are officially noted.  However, an announcement was made on The Record when ASU announced the hiring of interim head baseball coach Tim Esmay earlier this month.

CLICK HERE to read the full Arizona Republic report.

Esmay has been to Omaha six times with ASU, including as a player

Tim Esmay (ASU Photo)

for University Athletics Lisa Love. “As a graduate of ASU, he offers perspective as both a Sun Devil student-athlete and as a coach. He brings a wealth of ASU familiarity to our current team as well as significant head coaching experience.”

Esmay was the head baseball coach at the University of Utah from 1997 to 2004, winning a WAC title and WAC Coach of the Year honors in 1997. In eight seasons at Utah he compiled a 213-235-1 record. Esmay had 18 of his players go on to play professional baseball, including three from his last team in 2004. He also had 27 players earn all-conference honors during his tenure.

“I’m excited at the opportunity to continue the tradition that has been established by Coach Bobby Winkles, Coach Jim Brock and Coach Pat Murphy,” Esmay said.

“We are excited about the upcoming season with Tim Esmay at the helm,” Love added.

Esmay began his coaching career following his playing days at Arizona State (1986-87). He served as an assistant coach at Arizona State under Jim Brock from 1988 to 1990, then again in Brock’s final season of 1994. He returned to Arizona State in 2005 as an assistant coach, helping the team to a third place national finish and an appearance in the College World Series. He was named the Assistant Head Coach prior to the 2007 season and served in that capacity in each of the past three seasons, winning three straight Pac-10 titles and advancing to the College World Series twice.

Over his playing and coaching career, Esmay has been a part of six teams that played in the College World Series in Omaha, Nebraska (1987, 1988, 1994, 2005, 2007, 2009).

Esmay was a two-year starter for the Sun Devils following an All-American career at Scottsdale Community College. The infielder hit .305 (121-for-397) during his two years in Tempe with 23 doubles and five home runs. He was a member of ASU’s 1987 College World Series team and was named to the All-West Region team that season.

A graduate of Horizon High School, where his number 5 was retired in 1998, Esmay also coached at Brophy College Prep in Phoenix for two years (1992-93) and was an assistant at Grand Canyon University (1995) and Utah (1996) before taking over the head job in Salt Lake City in 1997.

Esmay’s eight-year career at Utah also saw his teams completely rewrite the Ute record books. In his first season directing the Utah baseball program, Esmay did what no Ute coach had done in 32 years when he led Utah to a WAC division title and a 36-21-1 record in 1997. The Utes posted a 22-8 record in the Northern Division that year. They also set nine school records as Esmay was named the 1997 Louisville Slugger WAC Coach of the Year. In 2002, Esmay guided Utah to a 33-26 overall and 16-14 conference record. The 33 wins is the second most in school history since 1963, and the second-place league finish is the Utes best since joining the MWC in `99. Senior pitcher Mitch Maio garnered 2002 MWC Co-Player of the Year honors.

Esmay replaces Pat Murphy, who resigned his position as ASU head coach on Nov. 20th.

All hires are pending approval by ASU’s Human Resources Department.

(Release & Staff Report)