Sports
New Era Begins for Vista Murrieta Baseball with New but Seasoned Coach
With five straight CIF appearances, Coach Kurt Ruth will shoot for number six as he takes over the head varsity baseball coaching position at Vista Murrieta High School.
With the season about to start, the Vista Murrieta High School Varsity Boys Baseball Team is moving into a new era with head coach Kurt Ruth, who has been the varsity pitching coach for the Broncos for the past seven years.
After seven seasons at the helm, Dave Legg stepped down as head varsity coach of the Bronco Baseball program in 2010.
Coach Legg finished his coaching career for the Broncos with some amazing stats:
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- One CIF champion title
- One CIF runner-Up title
- Two Southwestern league titles
- Five straight CIF playoff appearances
Like his predecessor, Ruth is no stranger to producing great baseball teams as a high school head coach.
In 1998, Ruth was the head coach at South Torrance High School, where he took the Spartans to their first CIF appearance in more than 10 years. That same year, he was honored as the Daily Breeze's Coach of the Year.
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Again in 2003, as the head baseball coach of the Carson Colts, Ruth was Daily Breeze's Coach of the Year, taking that team to the CIF finals at Dodger Stadium.
Upon moving to Murrieta in 2004, Ruth became the Broncos' head basketball coach, leading the varsity team for the past six years.
"After lots of family talks and late night conversations with my wife, Cindy, I decided to step down at the end of last season in order to watch our son, Aaron, a freshman at Vista Murrieta, play varsity soccer during the winter sports season,” Ruth said.
What happened shortly after that could not have worked out any better for him when Legg decided to step down as the head varsity baseball coach in order to be able to watch his sons, DC and Derek, play college baseball.
The timing was perfect for Ruth so he took the proper channels in applying for the varsity baseball position. With the blessing of Coach Legg and the athletic department, a new coaching legacy has started for the Broncos.
The varsity coaching staff will basically stay intact, with Coach Legg staying on board as an assistant coach and the addition of pitching coach Eric Fagen. Fagen has been a longtime junior varsity coach with the Broncos. Also on staff is George Jones, who was the varsity baseball coach at in 2008 and 2009.
For Ruth, the team motto for this year is, "One pitch at a time.”
He further set the standard but laying out the expectations.
"The expectation is to win; we never step foot onto a field without expecting to win,” Ruth said.
