Sportswriters enjoy waxing poetic about the languid pace and timelessness of baseball. Don't try that on Bishop Chatard High School coach Mike Harmon, however.

With his talented team at 7-6, he had to take action and shuffle players defensively to find the most effective alignment.

"Defensively, we were very concerned," Harmon said. "We thought that was the one thing we could count on (coming into the season).

"We tried a lot of different combinations, but we didn't have the luxury of using them for 10 to 15 games in a row. It was three or four games here and there to try to find the right combination."

The coaching staff also put more pressure on the players in practice and constructed game-like situations to evaluate the alignments.

The result has Kevin Ball, a three-year starter at second base, in left field to solidify the outfield defense, sophomore Billy White taking over at second and freshman Bobby Akin at third.

The Trojans lost their top two starting pitchers to graduation, but Matt Carr and Nick Beery emerged early in the season.

The hitting has been more consistent; Ball's average fell below .100 the first two weeks but now is .393. Carr, a returning All-City performer, is hitting .371. Sophomore catcher Scott Mourey is at .385 and leads the team in doubles.

"We talk about breaking the season into thirds," said Harmon, whose team's only loss in the past nine games came against Cathedral in the City Tournament championship. "After the City Tournament we'd played two-thirds of the schedule, and we're playing our best baseball entering the last third of the season."