Round-Trippers

THOUSAND OAKS —  Baseball can be defined as a quest to return home. Life, too, sometimes.

Dan Loyd and Jim Stout, 23-year-old seniors for the Cal Lutheran baseball team, speak from experience with voices that resonate with maturity.

Having come full-circle, both are grateful to be home again.

Loyd, a first baseman, and Stout, a center fielder, have provided a transfer of power this season for Cal Lutheran (16-5-2), which hosts UC San Diego today in a nonconference doubleheader.

The Kingsmen, alone in first place with a 12-1 record, are closing in on an eighth Southern California Intercollegiate Athletic Conference title in nine years.

Loyd, who transferred from Murray State in Kentucky, is batting .351 and leads the team with six home runs and 26 runs batted in. Stout, a transfer from Chico State, is batting .313 with three home runs and ranks second on the team with 23 RBIs.

They account for almost one-quarter of the team’s runs.

“They bring us a lot of leadership,” Coach Marty Slimak said. “The younger guys look up to them because of their past and the programs [they came from]. Being older, they kind of command that.”

Both are from Southern California. Loyd graduated from San Marino High, Stout from Cerritos Gahr.

Both left home for college after graduating in 1995. Both became frustrated by not finding the right fit.

“When you love something as much as Jim and I love baseball, and the sport’s not going your way, no matter how much everything else is fun, it just breaks your heart,” Loyd said.

Said Stout: “I like to do whatever I can do to help the team win. I’m not a big ‘I’ guy. But I wasn’t playing, so. . . .”

Loyd, a three-sport athlete in high school, accepted a football scholarship to Arizona, where he was third-string quarterback behind former Newbury Park standout Keith Smith. Loyd transferred to Murray State.

Stout, who played football and baseball in high school, transferred from Cerritos College to Chico State, where he logged only 10 at-bats last season for a team that won the NCAA Division II championship.

Family ties, more than lack of playing time, played a greater role in both deciding to spend their final seasons of eligibility in Southern California.

“The hardest part of being away is not having anybody to cheer for you,” Stout said. “I do better when my mom and dad and aunt and uncle come to the games.”

Said Loyd: “When I was in Kentucky, I could have the worst game or the best game and all it was was a phone call home. They couldn’t see it.”

For Loyd, whose mother is disabled by multiple sclerosis, the benefits of playing near home are twofold.

“I’m medicine for her,” Loyd said. “I’m just glad [my parents] are here. They’re glad I’m here. I was planning on going back to Murray State, but her condition was so that she couldn’t travel. So why stay out there if my parents can’t see me play?”

Loyd started at first base for Murray State last season, batting .324 with 12 home runs and a team-high 50 RBIs. He also played two seasons at quarterback, passing for almost 2,000 yards as a starter in 1997.

But life in southwestern Kentucky introduced the California native to some cold realities.

“We played games in Kentucky and we would have four snow delays,” Loyd said.

Likewise, Stout grew lonesome living in Northern California.

“I think it has to do with a combination of everything,” Stout said. “Everybody gets homesick. It has to do with how much you are playing and how much [the school] is satisfying your needs.”

Slimak rolled out the welcome mat at Cal Lutheran, which lost 12 players from a team that was 33-14 last season and advanced to the Division III national championships.

With the addition of Loyd and Stout, the Kingsmen will vie for a fifth appearance in the last nine years in the national championships.

“We needed help in the outfield and we needed help at first base,” Slimak said. “Both positions were wide open. With those guys coming in, we didn’t lose much.”