Bauermeister gets new job title

Barry Faulkner

Kirk Bauermeister has resigned as baseball coach and boys athletic

director at Costa Mesa High to become an assistant principal at the

school.

Bauermeister, a Costa Mesa alumnus who has coached the Mustangs

baseball team in two separate tours covering 13 seasons, said final

confirmation of his new position awaits approval by the school board.

But he said the school has begun the process of hiring a new boys

athletic director, as well as a baseball coach.

“I had to think long and hard before taking this new position,

because I love the kids I have in the baseball program.,”

Bauermeister said. “The timing also makes things difficult. It might

have been a little easier to make this transition over the summer.”

Bauermeister spent the last four years as athletic director. He

was a catalyst in the school’s hiring of Bob Serven, who within two

seasons coached the boys basketball team to a share of the program’s

first league championship.

Bauermeister first coached the Mesa baseball team from 1981-88. He

replaced Doug Deats as the Mustangs’ coach after the 1997 season and

guided them to two CIF Southern Section Division IV quarterfinal

appearances the next five seasons.

Mesa lost to eventual runner-up El Segundo in the 1999

quarterfinals and was eliminated, 5-4, in eight innings by Bonita in

2001, finishing 17-10-1 to break the school single-season victory

record of 16 his 1999 team tied.

The Mustangs missed the playoffs last season after finishing

13-13. During his second tenure, Bauermeister’s teams were 58-69-2.

Bauermeister said Pat Leahy, the school’s girls athletic director,

will handle all athletic administration until a boys athletic

director is hired.