Ball Park Empty

The Memorial Day weekend is the traditional opening of the American Legion Baseball season.  Today the field now known as Coleman Pitt Post 58 American Legion Field sits empty due to the fact there is not enough interest from local players eligible to play want to play.

This is a sad end for a sport in Rocky Mount known for the place Jim Thrope lost all his Olympic metals because he came to play professional baseball for a summer in Rocky Mount.  I'm not sure if anyone still around knows what year Legion started in Rocky Mount.  It is thought sometime during the 1930's.  Exactly when they started playing in the old Mumicipal Stadium on Howell Street is somewhat an unknown too.

I first saw the old stadium in 1963 as batboy for Ahoskie Legion Post 102 and I thought this must be what Yankee Stadium looks like.  Walking into the front gate dragging the Legion bats, entering the dressing room under  the stadium and walking through the dressing room into  the dugout looking toward the field.  I remember at ten years old standing in the dugout I could not see beyond the third base foul line because of the slant on the infield for the water to run off.

A state Legion title and five Rocky Mount high baseball titles have been won on the old field which is all that is left and it has no way of telling us of all the history played there.  If you think of minor league players who past through as well the old park has a tremendous history that it seems our kids of today don't want to be a part of it.I

The University of North Carolina has received from the NCAA their formal complaints about the Academic scandal at UNC.  A major penalty is on the way for the Tar Heels.  The bottom line is Carolina set up fake classes to allow athletes to get enough credits to stay eligible to keep playing their sports.

Do I feel like that every college in America doesn't help athletes in some way to keep them eligible?  It happens every where just maybe not to the point of down right cheating.  What does this really mean when a major University of the world has to make up classes where no one attends, have to have extra help just to give extra additional training to those that can not survive in a college atmosphere with out changing grades, getting someone else take their test or just give a grade and never attend.

The bottom line is those athletes should not have been at Carolina or any other school where they can't pass the work presented by a professor every day.  Any thing beyond a required study hall for athletes is too much.

What has happened to our academic world is there is so much money made by sports that money is an idol for all universities and they worship money and more money.  I think my solution is make sports a school of the university just like the business school or engineering school.  Set up classes based on athlete's future being in sports whether playing, coaching, marketing or management.  If an athlete can't cut it in a program like that keep them out of our colleges.