UCI to name baseball field after famed scientist

The Orange County Register

April 28th, 2009

By Gary Robbins

Cicerone throws out first pitch at Anteater Park
in January 2002. Image courtesy of UCI Athletics

At a public ceremony on May 19, UC Irvine will name its baseball diamond Cicerone Field in honor of Ralph Cicerone, the university’s former chancellor and a internationally known climate scientist. Cicerone played a major role in restoring baseball as a Division 1 sport in 2002, a decade after the program was eliminated due to budget cuts. The men’s baseball team is currently ranked No. 1 in the country.

The ceremony will begin at 5:30 p.m., shortly before UCI begins play against UCLA. The diamond will officially be called Cicerone Field at Anteater Park.

Cicerone later left UCI and became president of the National Academy of Sciences, the elite honorific society founded during the Lincoln Administration.

Cicerone as a pitcher at MIT.
Image by Erkki Corpuz courtesy of MIT.

Although he’s well known for his research on climate change, Cicerone his deeply passionate about baseball and pitched for the Massachusetts Institute of Technology during his undergradudates days.