Washed Out

Tonight's Legion game between Post 39 from Greenville and Post 58 from Rocky Mount was rained out by a cloud that just would not go away. Radar showed clear just on the out skirts of Rocky Mount but the cloud kept building and building. It was never a heavy rain but after about and hour and a half the short stop area began to look like a mud hole.

Sometimes you can be so close to something you can't see it because it is so close. Tonight's game will probably not be made up because this is a non-conference game and now that the league play has started, a non-conference game messes with you pitching set up for conference games.

I have told you on this web site that Greenville is in our conference but they are not. I could not figure out why we play four of the five league members three times and Greenville only twice. Now I know.

Post 58 is back in action Thursday with a trip to Greenville and Post 39. 39 coming in tonight's game was 10-1 on the season. Winterville no longer has a Legion team so all of the Pitt county schools are back with Post 39 the way it use to be.

Rocky Mount Gryphon Benton Moss was named pitcher of the year in the Big East Conference. Boy what a surprise that is! Moss leads a contingent of four Gryphons who made the all conference team. Collins Cuthrell Thomas Berry and Hobbs Johnson.

This tid bit of information comes from Charles Alston and this is hard to believe but true. Thomas Berry had 16 hits on the season. Ten home runs and six singles. Not one double or triple

Mathew Berry and Spencer Bell were second team and Michael Whitehead was honorable mention all conference.

T J Taylor from Nash Central was the only other Nash County player who made all conference.

Rumors have been flying around about all these Super Conferences in college football and Texas kind of spoiled the party for everyone. they are staying put in the Big Twelve. The dust may not be settled yet if Notre Dame makes a move but with no Super Conference being formed the pressure is not really on Notre Dame any more to join a conference.

The Pac 16 will only be twelve with only Colorado and Utah joining. The P-12 just knew with Texas coming they were going to be THE conference in football. In the end they got the worse two teams of the six they thought they were going to get.

Marlins win Little League Crown

It took all night, but by 9.15 Tuesday evening, the Marlins had beaten Yankees in the second game of a doubleheader 6-5 to win the Rocky Mount Parks and Recreation Little League championship.

The Marlins, the only team unbeaten in the city's year-ending tournament, played the Yankees at 5.30 and all they had to do was beat the Yankees and they were the champs.

Sam Toler and his Yankees were not willing to go down without a fight and beat the Marlins 4-1 in game one setting up the winner take-all second game and doubleheader.Tyler Barrett Darren Simpkins each had two hits in the victory.

Momentum clearly was on their side as the Yankees scored twice in the bottom of the first to lead the Marlins 2-0 in game two. The Marlins scratched five runs across the plate in the top of the second and they would never give up the lead, but almost.

In the bottom of the third, the Yankees had the bases loaded and at one point nobody out, but with one out, they hit a pop-up to short right field that was going to be trouble for the Marlins. But second baseman Scooter Jones caught the ball almost on the right field line and threw the tagging runner on third out at home and the Yankees got, nothing when they were poised to take the lead.

The Marlins scored one in the fifth and the Yankees had two in the fifth and one in the sixth but only one run in the bottom of the sixth left them one run short and the Joe Bell led Marlins are the city champs of Rocky Mount Little league.

The Marlins can give as much credit to their defense for the victory as their glove work that kept them from giving up the lead .

Peyton Myrick and myself did the Midget League championship last week and two games today for the Stretchlon Sports Show. You could not have asked for any better games than these three. The Marlins won the 9-10 year old Midget League title 12-10 by putting two runners out at home in the last inning and tonight the Yankees had their chances. but they came up a run short.

I hope later in the week we will be able to provide for you all of the All-Stars players representing Rocky Mount in the playoffs this year.

Post 58's Legion team is home at 7 p.m. Wednesday at Gryphon Stadium.

Legion Wins Again

Tonight Coleman-Pitt Post 58 ran past Wilson Post 13 for the second time in a week winning tonight at home 9-3. This makes 58 2-0 in conference play and 7-3 and sets up a showdown Wednesday night at Gryphon Stadium against Pitt County Post 39.

I have had a Monday of all Mondays today and missed the game tonight due to car trouble. To make a long story short I had my gold Chevy Luv pickup in the shop and my wife Pat's car is what I have been driving to work with my truck in shop. As I left work today around 4.00pm My Ignition system would not allow my key to go into the key hole and it was after seven before I had any vehicle rolling. What a Day this has been.

Congratulation to Collins Cuthrell who early last week signed with Barton College to play baseball. Collins had been looking for any school that would allow him to play football and baseball and it looked as if Methodist in Fayetteville was going to be that school. I think baseball in college Collins will do real well probably at third base. He has surely over the past two years in high school and now a summer an a half of Legion proven that he can play in college any where.

Charles Alston is reporting on the Rocky Mount high web site that Former Gryphon Brian Goodwin has made the Louisville Slugger freshman All American team. Brian led Carolina in Rbi's this season and tied the school record for most triples in a season.

The ACC will send two teams to the College World Series this weekend and Clemson joined Florida State today. Virginia unless they score a dozens runs in the bottom of the ninth will get white washed by Oklahoma.

Finally some sanity comes to college football. Texas and Oklahoma have decided to stay put in the Big Twelve conference. This means that Nebraska and Colorado are the only two teams to jump ship. This leaves Notre Dame as what I feel is having to make a decision about joining a football conference. If the major conferences continue to line up in even bigger super conferences they are going to tell Notre Dame sorry but you are not in our playoff format.

After all the hoopla about the Big Twelve dissolving wouldn't it be something if the Irish joined the Big 12. Wouldn't that be a slap at the Big ten if that happened.

Future Is Bright

This Spring the Lady Gryphons soccer team stopped a seven year conference winning streak at Fike and in doing so won the number one seed in the conference . Three players from that team made all conference. Kelsey Benson, Casey Cooke and Sydney Browder. All three return next year.

I told you I was going to find out what I could about a wooden bat league. Today they play at Faith Christian School's baseball field at 1.00pm. The players from the area that I know about on this team are Former Rocky Mount players Chad Womble, Dillon Cockrell and Gabe Brown. Alex Pearce from Nash Central and Andrew Webb from Northern Nash are some of the players on the team.

Post 58 has not played since last Tuesday night and they will return to action Monday night as they host Wilson Post 13. Post 13 did play another conference game last week and lost to Pitt County Post 39 14-13. I hope being off six days that 58 doesn't show any rust.

The ACC sent four team to the Super regional of the NCAA baseball tournament. Virginia is the only team with zero losses. They can make it to the College World series with a win today over Oklahoma. Florida State can make it to the Series with a win today also but they are tied 1-1 in their series so they could also get sent home with a loss. Clemson loss the first game in their series 5-4 with Alabama and Miami (if you could ever say a team gave a game away this is it) has six errors in losing in extra innings to Florida. Miami's baseball season is over.

I need to vent just a little. I have a daughter Morgan who will turn 16 this Thursday. In no way would I allow her to drive to Raleigh by herself. How in heavens name can any parent allow a sixteen year old get on a sailboat and even try to sail around the world by themselves? This young girl who's mast has been beaten off the boat by high winds and waves is being rescued in the Indian Ocean.

First question who is going to pay all this money wasted on the rescue. There has to be people who become the first to do things. Charles Linburgh the first to fly solo across the Atlantic. Look what that opened up to the world by his courage. I don't see where this young girl being the youngest ever to sail around the world is important at all.

We spend a lot of money rescuing people being stupid. Climbing mountains etc. People have to risk their lives to save these fools. I don't care how bad the economy is, when there is enough money to spend it doing ridiculous things as this then we have too much money.

Everchanging World

Today, Nash County will send another flock of graduates out into the world. It there is one thing that we all have to understand is nothing is ever the same. Those who adjust as the world unfolds think everything is just like it always was. When we look back, the world is nothing like my graduation day.

The TV had three network. CBS, NBC and ABC. Hard to believe ESPN is still almost 10 years away.

I use to spin records as a disc jockey. Today when you go into a radio station, no one has a turntable.

If I needed to call home, I'd go to a phone booth and put a dime in the phone and called my dad. Can you find a phone booth today? If you did, there was a book to look up any number, today you'd only see torn out pages.

If you wanted to get updated news, the newspaper came early in the morning or here in Rocky Mount, the Evening Telegram landed in the early afternoon. There was no local 5 a.m. newscast, no CNN keeping us up to the minute in the world.

You could go to a service station and someone there filled you up and checked the oil and you never got out of the car. And we call this world we live in progress?

You use to park right in front of the business on Main Street that we wanted to go to. Today, we walk a mile in the parking lot just to walk another mile once inside the mall.

I could walk in a store, find what I wanted and be out in a jiffy. Today after walking that mile to find it and now stand in line a half hour to pay for it. Progress!

There was a time when going on a Sunday afternoon to park on Main Street and watch the cars go by or sit on your porch and enjoy life. Today it's too hot to be outside, so let's get into the air conditioning.

Today we have HD TV. The very first TV that I ever saw in color was President John F. Kennedy's funeral.

I wanted to be a millionaire. Today, if you only have 10 billion, you are considered working class.

Those that graduate today will one day ride on roads that will have electronic sensors that guide your car without a steering wheel.

Those that graduate today will one day be able to send by your TV screen into someone else home to see you as they talk to you. Sorry, we can already do that. Progress I can't keep up with it.

Graduates today, as you know, it will not be the same 30 years from now. My hope is that 30 years from now the official language of this country is not Chinese.

Punish The Guilty

The NCAA finally made their announcement of the infractions of the Southern Cal football team and other sports. Two years with out bowls games , a loss of thirty scholarships and forfeiting of games in 2004 and 2005.



I am no way a fan of the Trojans. The penalties that have been imposed are base on what happen in 2004-2005. Those guilty they are free as a bird. Reggie Bush took $300,000 dollars to buy a home, a car and look big on campus. Pete Carroll the football coach is off coaching the NFL now. Who is stuck with the pain?, but players who were not even there when this cheating occurred.

Yes the athletic director is the same and I say fire him. Don't hurt those that are blameless. Fine the school five million dollars and tell Pete Carroll he can never coach in the NCAA again but don't ruin college for those not responsible. Take away every trophy that Reggie Bush has linking him to the NCAA. Ban those that gave the money to never set foot on any college campus again. Just seems to me innocent until proven guilty means find somebody to punish.

My take on all this conference realignment is this is the first step to ending the NCAA as we know it. Football is going to be totally different from everything else. Why take the Texas tennis team and fly them to Spokane Washington for a conference game. That is ridiculous! Football is going to wind up being a division by itself and all other sports in another league. That's what greed will do for you.

Last night I was out at the Sports Complex and we did the Midget League championship game for the city of Rocky Mount. Marlins beat the Cubs 12-10 and the cubs had two runners out at home on force plays in the last inning. A really good game.

It doesn't really matter how old you are if both teams are even you can really has some fun watching good athletic events. This one surely was.

Pod System Approved By NCHSAA

The North Carolina High School Athletic Association has approve a Pod format during the 2010 football playoffs. Ever since the playoffs have been that all teams that met the four win rule got into the playoffs there are circumstances where a team from say Topsoil had to travel to Murphy in the first round. That's a long ways for a team that might be 1-9 go and lose 70 to 0.

The idea behind the pod system is you will play teams from your geographical area and after you win your pod you would by the third round be match up against another pod winner. This format is much like the NCAA baseball regional is set up but there is one major difference. There are no other conference members in your regional but if you are going to stay within your local geographical region why then will not all four of the Big East teams be in the same pod.

This is where this pod system sticks in my craw. I can easily see Rocky Mount and Northern Nash playing for the conference title one Friday night and turn around and play each other in the first round. Now that is ridiculous. You say that will never happen. If Northern had of beat Rocky Mount last year the way the other final games play out Rocky Mount would not have made the playoffs. Why then is it now conceivable that one team or the other could win the conference and the other fall to fourth and wind up playing again next week?

I really see a pod having three Big East teams and another in a pod. That would mean if the one seed is a big East, then second team could also be a Big East team, then third could be a Big East squad. The four seed could come from another conference.

That would match a 2/3 Big East opening round game and if the #1 seed the Big East wins then the second round is Big East against Big East. yuks!!!! Thats the first two rounds playing conference members.

I know with our economic conditions in the world today we are having to save at every turn. The easiest way to save is cut out one round of the playoffs and a 1-9 team will not have to travel any where but to basketball practice.

Most of the long drives for teams are mostly in the 1-A where all the 1-A schools are either in the extreme east or extreme west of the state. Eliminate on playoff game in 1-A or if there is a problem in 2-A cut out a game there too.

It seems to me they are taking from Peter to pay Paul but if Paul was only 3-7 last year he shouldn't be in the playoffs anyway.

Case closed!