Olson inks with UC Davis

Even when he was an infant, Cameron Olson had a connection to baseball.

Family pictures show him attending San Francisco Giants spring training games in Arizona when he was a mere 3 months old and ever since he learned how to walk, Olson has been playing the sport he loves.

"Baseball has pretty much dominated my life," Olson said on Wednesday. "When I was little, I always wanted to play first base for the Giants and be like J.T. Snow."

He may not have reached his goal of playing at AT&T Park just yet, but Olson's prowess on the diamond has earned him some recognition in the collegiate ranks.

Olson, a senior at River Valley High, recently signed a national letter of intent to play for Division-I UC Davis beginning in the spring of 2013.

He received a full academic scholarship.

At Davis, Olson will play catcher, a position he took up as a youngster while playing for the Yuba City Flood competitive traveling team.

"I didn't start catching until I was 10, but I love it," he said. "I like being involved in every play. I like back-picking people, I like throwing people out, I like blocking — I like everything about the position.

"You get to control the game when you're back there calling pitches."

Olson was the only Falcon to play in all 28 games last season and he went on to lead the team in batting average (.385), runs scored (29) and doubles (nine).

His 17 RBIs were second on the club, and he also went 2-1 with two saves while sporting a solid 3.46 ERA on the hill.

As a sophomore, Olson led the Falcons with a .379 batting average while scoring a team-high 28 runs and leading the team in doubles with 12.

Playing catcher, he threw out 14 of the 25 base runners who tried to steal against him.

However, Olson ran into some problems late last season when he injured his arm pitching against Woodland in a Tri-County Conference game. Tests later revealed he tore the teres major in his throwing shoulder and he underwent surgery in August to repair the damage.

He had to wear a sling for the first few weeks of school and is just now returning to full health.

"I played all summer with it, but it got to a point where I couldn't throw anymore and that's when I had it done," Olson said of the surgery. "I'm still rehabbing it a little bit, but my last rehab appointment is next week and if it's good, I'm cleared to play."

In the meantime, Olson decided to not play basketball for the Falcons this winter and opted instead to lift weights to ready himself for the upcoming baseball season.

"The last three or four months he's worked his butt off in the weight room and I think that will help him at the next level," River Valley baseball coach Billy Rollins said. "I think he realized that to take that next step you have to put in the time, and you can see it in his physique. He's put on 15 pounds of muscle in the last few months."

Olson, who carries a 3.73 grade point average, thanked his father, Brian, along with Eric Lay, his coach with the Colusa County Channel Cats, for helping him along the way.

He is the first Falcon baseball player to sign to with Division-I college right out of high school. 2009 graduate Kenton Bevacqua signed with Oklahoma State this summer after playing two years at Solano College.

And while he received offers from other schools, for Olson, location was the deciding factor.

"I wanted to stay close to home and I liked how close they were," he said.

With the Aggies, he will compete in the ultra-competitive Big West Conference, where they play powerhouses Cal State Fullerton, UC Irvine and Long Beach State among others.

"He's an even better kid than he is a baseball player," Rollins said. "The goal is to spit out productive members of society, and you can see he was raised right. He's just a great kid to coach."