What evidence exists to support appellant's claim of self-defense in a case where appellant's father is accused of striking appellant's mother in the head with a baseball bat?

a threatening manner.⁵ In light of such evidence, appellant's claim of self-defense was highly improbable. To this, we would add that appellant's counsel did not inform the juvenile court, by offer of proof or otherwise, of the nature of the anticipated testimony. For example, there was no offer of proof indicating that appellant's father was ever the aggressor in any previous fight with any adult, or that any previous fight had a basis for a reasonable comparison to the present incident. (See People v. Thomas (1969) 269 Cal.App.2d 327, 329 [explaining need for offer of proof].) On such a record, it would have fairly appeared to the juvenile court that the subject of the proposed cross-examination (i.e., what may have transpired in a fight between appellant's father and some other adult at some previous time) was at best merely a tangential matter of little or no probative value in the present case. Consequently, we are unable to conclude the juvenile court manifestly acted unreasonably or arbitrarily in its restriction of further cross-examination as to prior fights engaged in by appellant's father with anyone.