East Union’s Cherish Burks a ‘run-scoring machine’

Whenever baseball fans talk about records that will never be broken, there are two or three that inevitably come up.

Cy Young’s 511 career victories, Joe DiMaggio’s 56-game hitting streak and Johnny Vander Meer’s back-to-back no-hitters are favorites of the trivia sect.

But one that often gets overlooked is Babe Ruth’s 177 runs in a single season (1921), which is weird because scoring runs is the entire point of the game.

Only three times since the mark was established in 1921 has anybody even reached the 160s (none since 1936), so it appears that Ruth’s standard is probably safe for another 94 years.

Safe, that is, unless East Union High softball player Cherish Burks ever makes it to the big leagues.

Burks, who helped lead the Lancers to the Sac-Joaquin Section Division III championship and a Cal-Hi Sports state championship, scored a staggering 52 runs in 31 games this season.

That’s 1.68 runs per game. Ruth scored at a rate of 1.16 per contest.

But baserunning wasn’t the only positive trait in Burks’ game. She can hit, hit with power, throw and field.

You know what that makes her, right?

Well, yes, it makes her a five-tool player, but it also makes her the Stanislaus District’s 2015 Player of the Year.

“I think what makes her special, other than all the tools, is that every time we played a good team you could see her raise her game,” said East Union coach Brian Goulart. “And she’s a run-scoring machine.”

Burks, who will play at the University of Oregon next season, hit .550 with four homers, three triples, 15 doubles and 31 RBIs. She drew 14 walks and stole 10 bases in 10 attempts. And, of course, she scored a ton of runs.

If you want to put a couple of box scores in the proverbial time capsule to describe Burks’ game, the box scores from her final two games of her high school career would do nicely.

After losing in the Division IV final last season to Oakdale, Burks and the Lancers reached the D-III semifinals this season before losing 4-2 to Pioneer (Woodland) in the semifinals of the double-elimination tournament.

Kicked into the losers’ bracket, the Lancers beat Vanden (Fairfield) 7-4 to set up a rematch with the Patriots. East Union needed to win twice in a row to capture the pennant.

In the final two win-or-go-home games, Burks was a combined 5 for 6 with six runs scored, as the Lancers won the first game 12-1 and took the clincher 17-3.

“It took me a while for me to realize that we actually won the section championship,” said Burks. “I couldn’t believe it at first. Then, all of a sudden, it hit me. I looked in the mirror and thought, ‘Wow! We just won a section title.’ ”

Burks’ leadership was on display in those final two games.

“Before the game, she walked over to me and said, ‘Coach, don’t give me or Michelle (Castro) or Sam (Owen) or Alexis (Erich) any signs today; we already know what we want to do today,’” said Goulart. “I said, ‘I’ll give you a couple of innings to do your thing. You sell me.’ She hit the second pitch of the game off the fence for a double. Then Castro bunts for a hit, Sam hits a line drive off the third baseman’s foot and Alexis hits a line drive to right.

“All I had to do was wave my arm as they were rounding third.”

Goulart said that the moment Burks’ double hit the wall in center field, he knew it would be the Lancers’ day.

“That was the ball game, right there,” said Goulart.

And just like that, the loss to Oakdale in the 2014 final was nothing more than a memory.

“There was a lot of pressure on us this year, but it was a positive kind of pressure, if that makes any sense. Everybody wanted to see the team do well and helping the team get there was a great kind of pressure.

“But I wouldn’t trade it for anything.”

This story was originally published June 18, 2015 at 6:02 PM with the headline "East Union’s Cherish Burks a ‘run-scoring machine’."