Let The Playoffs Begin

D H Conley is a very familiar face to Rocky Mount fans having been in the Big East 4-A with them. It is going to seem like old home week as two of our Gryphons teams Host Conley this week. Soccer host Conley at 5.00pm Wednesday as they Begin what they hope is a long journey in the playoffs, one lost and a sudden end can end the season.

Baseball is waiting until Friday night to host Conley at Gryphon Stadium. I am not sure what coach Kent Cox has in mind for his pitching rotation this week with only one game but it would not surprise me to see both Johnson and Moss get innings in. Especially if we were to fall behind early, you can't afford to get too far behind once the playoffs get here.

Fike High school finished tenth in the State championships in golf which finished up Tuesday.

Coach Mike Gainey gets one more game coaching Tashawn Mabry. That will happen in the annual East-West all Star game held July 19th in Greensboro all part of clinic week for high school coaches. Gainey will have three state champions as part of his roster as two players from Kinston the 2-A state champs will take part. Reggie Bulluck and Dory Hines. Gainey will also coach Fike's Jerrel Williams in the game. Since Christmas Mike Gainey sure has lived the life winning the 3-A state championship and follow that up being on display in front of his peers in Greensboro in July.

Can someone please explain to me how the World golfing rankings work? Tiger Woods has had only one top ten finish in the last five months and yet remains the #1 golfer in the world. second in the rankings is Phil Mickelson,then he is followed by Steve Stricker, Lee Westwood and Jim Furyk.

N C State and Carolina have two weekends of ACC regular season baseball to decide which one makes the ACC tournament and which one stays home. Carolina play Virginia while State plays Florida State. Then next weekend State gets Duke and Carolina gets surprising Virginia Tech. State has to win one more game than Carolina since the Tar Heels won two of three from the Pack in March.

All this college conference expansion talk - it would not shock me at all to Florida State jump to the Southeastern. If the ACC loses some who will they get back. I realize they are not sports powers but here is two I would like just for the prestige. Army and Navy. Syracuse and Connecticut are more likely. I bet the ACC has 16 team by 2012.

Does any body remember why the ACC was born. The original members of the ACC thought the Southern Conference was too big. Isn't it funny that as humans we keep right on repeating history!

We All Could Use Some Humbie Pie

Athletics at Rocky Mount High School have been blessed over the years. This athletic season is coming to a close and Rocky Mount is on the verge of winning the Wachovia Cup as the top athletic program in the Big East conference. This has been a very good year to say the least.

Softball has not had the pleasure of putting up banners or ordering rings from state titles. Softball may have found out quicker than most athletes at RMHS, glory doesn’t shine all the time.

Athletics teaches endurance as much as any thing else. Every play is not a touch down. Every bat does not bring a hit. Endurance is tested when you lose every day. Why am I here? This is not fun! Why do I continue to do this?

Losing is a dose of reality. We as American have been indoctrinated that winning is every thing. Every game that has ever been played there was a winner and there was also a loser. Winning is 50/50 in every game. Victory covers up the mistakes that almost cost you the game while losing exposes them.

Years from now when each of these girls looks back on this softball season they will be proud that they stayed to the end, they endured. Once the season started only one player quit that didn’t finish what they started.

That’s remarkable to think that they didn’t jump ship when it seemed to be sinking. They all went down with the ship. They bailed as hard as they could until the end. They may think this ridiculous now but when they are 50 they will look back with pride that they endured.

Coach Tara McDonald has done a good job of keeping them together as the losses mounted. Talent was lacking but sprit was high till the end. These players have improved. The feeder program coming to Rocky Mount high is poor in training softball players. The Nashville rec league has a much better softball program that Rocky Mounts and it shows.

If you are a 300 hitter and improve you are way ahead of the girl trying to learn how to stand in the batters box. Rocky Mount softball talent problems will not be cured over night.

I hope coach McDonald comes back next year. She deserves a chance to see this program grow. I think she has shown that she has coaching ability to keep this team together.

This team will be able to say they stuck together. Together to the bitter end, because of that their future lives will be better for it.

THEY ENDURED!

Bulldog Wins The TPC

N C State Grad Tim Clark won the Tour Players championship this afternoon in Jacksonville Fl. Not only do I like Tim because he's a Wolfpacker and the other reason is I am taller than he is and can hit it about as far as he can. Eight times Clark has finished second on the PGA tour and had carried the label best player on tour without a win but no more.

Tiger Woods dropped out with an injury. This is me thinking out loud, any one besides me notice since the PGA random drug testing policy has been in place Tiger's body is falling apart?

I can take no credit for this like I tried to claim on my earlier blog today about the perfect game pitched by Jim Hunter. Today Dallas Braden of the A's pitched the second perfect game in Oakland history. Just some where on my blog today I awoke the baseball Gods in order for this to happen after I just spoke about Hunter's perfect game, so maybe I should try to take credit.

I can not for what ever reason get on the brackets and give you any playoff pairings at this time. I can tell you Rocky Mount will play D H Conley Friday night at Gryphon Stadium. Conley is the number three seed in the Coastal conference and this is not a good draw in the opening round. All high school teams have at least one decent pitcher and Conley has a really good one who has signed with ECU. You know he throws against Rocky Mount Friday. Gryphon hitters will determine whether the Gryphons move on to round two.

Softball opens play Monday at 7.30 in the Big East softball tournament. They face Nash Central who is the number three seed. This is their last chance at a victory this year.

Since I can't get on the NCHSAA web site I don't know who the tennis team plays Tuesday in the playoffs but they are home.

Girls soccer is home in the playoffs at 5.00pm Wednesday.

North Carolina did what they needed to do in ACC baseball. They swept Wake Forest over the weekend and are now tied with State for eighth. Brian Goodwin got another triple last night which is his sixth of the year. He is two off the Carolina record which is eight in a season. It would help his cause if Carolina could go deep in the NCAA's, but in order to do that they need to win four out of six the next two weeks against Virginia and Virginia Tech.

Elliott Avent won victory number 514 at N C State today. Aventon's very own is now the winningest coach in N C State history.

Mother's Day Quiet

Hope everyone is able to enjoy today with your family on this special day for Mothers May Ninth.

Yesterday was the anniversary of a special event that happen that I had nothing to do with but I sure thought I did. May eighth 1968 was the day that Jim Hunter pitched a perfect game for the Oakland A's. Back in those days when Philco transistor radios were the rage and with Oakland playing Minnesota there was no station on the east coast carrying the game on the radio.

If Oakland played in the east Baltimore, New York, Boston Cleveland or Detroit you might be able to find the game on that Philco and I could hear every pitch that he threw when the signal would not fade in and out like am radio can do at night. This game was in Oakland and even the paper had gone to press by the end of the game so there is no box score to jump out of bed for to see if Jimmy had won.

Local radio was however buzzing about the event. Jimmy Hunter had pitched a perfect game. The first perfect game in 55 years in the major leagues. Once I heard those words I was on cloud nine for the remainder of the day. My Geometry teacher was Dutch Overton who umpired high school baseball and was a scout for the Cleveland Indians. Dutch thought that Cleveland was going to sign Hunter right up to the point when Charles Finley offer a $75,000 bonus to sign when Cleveland had offered $50,000. There was no geometry class this day but an hour of Baseball.

Just five years earlier Jimmy was a member of the Ahoskie American Legion team who had played for the state championship with a ten year old boy named Tony dragging the bats. To me even today eleven years after his death I feel like he's part of my family just like Freddy and Francis Coombs were. All those guy on that team I had a bond with them even though most of them were six to eight years older than me.

Hunter set a record that that night which has yet to be broken. He had four rbi's while pitching the perfect game. Only six thousand saw the game which was the smallest crowd to watch a perfect game pitched. One oddity, that was the A's first year in Oakland and it was only the tenth major league game ever played in Oakland at that time.

Mis-spoke yesterday: I mis-spoke yesterday, I said that if Pitt CC won the region X title last night they would go the JUCO world series. Last night they beadt USC-Sumpter to win the title. 18-4. The Bulldogs now play in the Eastern District regional which the winner of regions X, XV and XX play each other with the winner going to the JUCO world series. This district tournament will be played in Winterville at Pitt. This will give local people a chance to see our three local players Jim Leggett, Zack Woodley and Mike Williams in college playoff games.

Pitt C C On Verge of JUCO World Series

Pitt Community College swept through the winners bracket Friday of the Region X baseball tournament and now wait for the losers bracket to get down to one . Saturday if Pitt wins the first game they will have gone through the Region X tournament undefeated and will go to the JUCO World Series in Grand Junction Colorado starting May 29th.

If Pitt loses Saturday then they get a second shot at the region title Sunday all of this action going on this week in Burlington. Two Northern Nash baseball players Zack Woodley and Mike Williams and Rocky Mount former player Jim Leggett are along for the ride as pitchers for Pitt.

Woodley and Williams both have been on the mound for Pitt seven times while Leggett was given the rawhide five times this season. Woodley has pitched over eleven innings and has a 3.97 era while Williams has pitched 8.1 inning with a 4.32 era. Leggett has pitched 8.2 inning and has a era of 4.15. Pitt has a record of 34-9 heading into Saturdays game.

College baseball is over for several teams and others prepare for their conference tournaments.

Brian Goodwin collect a couple of hits Friday and added to his North Carolina team lead in RBI's with 44. Carolina ripped Wake Forest Friday and needs to sweep the Demon Deacs this weekend to tie N C State for eighth place in the ACC. Goodwin is hitting 298 for the season for the Tar Heels.

Xavier Macklin continues to impress at North Carolina A&T. X is hitting 337 with nine homers and 47 rbi's. A&T finished second in the MEAC this season.

Bryan Braswell has started 34 of Campbell 46 baseball games and is hitting 317 on the season. Ben Fish still has three hits at Campbell in 17 at bats but those three hits have produced five rbi's.

Alex Pearce is hitting 208 for UNC Pembroke. He has now started 29 of their 47 games.

The first year of Wake Tech Baseball is over and Cameron Ramsey collect 29 hits in 36 games for a 240 batting average.

Wesley Joyner has batted three times this season at Mount Olive and collected two hits. I keep hearing that the divisions II national championships are going to be held at the USA baseball complex in Cary and Mount Olive is the host school. I guess that means they get to play in the tournament.

North Carolina Wesleyan's regular season conference championship was not enough to get them in the NCAA playoffs as they lost two straight games in the conference tournament.

Tyler Clark hit 317 on the season and started 31 games behind the plate. Southern Nash's Brian Allen hit a solid 307 in 25 starts. Daniel Moore 304 in his 26 starts. Andrew Webb hit 219 in 12 games that he played infield but Daniel made all conference pitching with a 5-2 record and an era of 2.83. Eric Mull former RMA player got on the field in eight games had one hit in six at bats. Chad Womble threw 25 innings on the mound and had 1-2 record for the Battling Bishops.

Lenoir C C had three local players as the Barnes brothers Zach and Patrick from Faith Christian saw action. Zach got to bat 12 times with four hits and Patrick four swings and collect two hits. Gabe Brown batted four times and scored two runs during the season.

Edmund Gravely has two hits on the season at Newberry college. Saw Tyler Joyner at the Northern- Rocky Mount game Thursday and he hopes to return back to the Pirates roster soon at ECU. So far this season he has one appearance and 1.1 innings pitched.

My last note for today Darius McKnight from the state champion Rocky Mount Gryphons will play college basketball at Davidson CC. The state community college system in order to attract students continues to add sports like basketball and baseball.

NCHSAA Takes a good First Step

The NCHSAA voted on Wednesday to cut the regular football season from twelve weeks to eleven, in esence they have eliminated any bye weeks for team that play eleven games.

A cost cutting moved was made to eliminate excessive travel in the playoffs. In the past there have too many instances of teams traveling three hundred miles for a opening round game. Teams will now be put in pods with other teams from your area. What does that mean? I hope it doesn't mean that if there are four teams from the Big East you would have to play a conference member for the first three rounds. Eliminate one week of the playoffs and no conference has more than three teams would work to my satisfaction.

Soccer lost Thursday night 1-0 to Fike in the Big East soccer tournament at Hunt. Both start the playoffs next week. The Big East softball tournament starts Monday at Glover Park in Nashville. I like this idea of neutral site. It kind of gives you the ACC basketball tournament when it is in Greensboro. Don't care where ever they may have the ACC tournament Greensboro is a good location for every body. Glover Park is good for everyone in the Big East.

Trivia: Thomas Berry hit two home runs last night in the Gryphon victory over Northern Nash. Can you name the last player to hit two in a game before last night?

If you love golf and back during the days when the ACC use to have the ACC Championship at NorthGreen quality golf is just down the road this weekend. The NCAA Women's Golf Regional is be played at Ironwood in Greenville and ECU is the host school. If you can stand being out in the heat all day this is a great place to be.

I just want to say what a pleasure it is going to Northern to film a game. Last night we filmed the game for the Stretchlon Sports show and as I entered the lady taking up tickets when she found out we were filming made me seem like ESPN was there. I entered the dugout and Coach Eddie Loesner and I had a pleasant conversation about the way Northern's season unfolded. Waiting for Kent Cox to finish talking to his Rocky Mount team after the game interview Athletic Director Dan Richwalski came over and thanked us for being there and invited us to come back any time.

I try when ever we do a game of the week to support all the teams on the broadcast. Since I have done Rocky Mount play by play more than any other I am to a certain extent seen as a Rocky Mount guy by most coaches. Last night from the ticket lady to Coach Loesner right to Richwalski, I hope that Northern can get back to a consistent winner in all sports. Through their sports leaders they deserve it.

Trivia Answer: Thomas Berry's brother Chris hit two home runs in a game against Greenville Rose in 2008. I wonder whether there are any more Berry's coming to play baseball at RM

Girls track Conference Champs Eighth Straight Time.

If there was any doubt about who was going to win the Big East Wachovia Cup the track teams at Rocky Mount sealed the deal Wednesday. The girls won their eighth straight title while the boys finished second.

This spring baseball, tennis and soccer along with girls track either won the regular season in their sport or shared the title. Boys track finished second. Golf and softball are the only two sports that were not close to the top of the standings.

Zikeena Parker was named MVP of girls track after winning three running events the 100,200 and 400 meter runs. Devonte Jenkins won three events for the boys in winning the MVP of the meet for the boys.

Next event on the schedule for both Rocky Mount track teams is the eastern regional May 15th at Nash Central

A perfect conference schedule was in jeopardy in the fourth inning tonight as Gryphon baseball whips arch rival Northern Nash 6-2 and goes 10- 0 in Big East play.

The Gryphons got all they needed in a two run homer by Collins Cuthrell and then Thomas Berry followed that with a solo blast to stake the Gryphons to a 3-0 in the first. Northern managed two runs off Benton Moss in the fourth to slice into the lead to 3-2, Rocky Mount accepted the challenge and responded with three runs in the fifth to salt the game away. winning 6-2.

The Gryphons collected ten hits including the Berry twins(Matthew and Thomas) with two hits each and two from Collins Cuthrell. Spencer Bell,Hobbs Johnson,Michael Whitehead and Taylor Clontz collected a hit a piece.

Benton Moss went the distance giving up four hits but once again walked only one batter and struckout ten in picking up another win.

The #1 seeded Gryphons open the playoffs Friday night May 14th at home. We will not know who they play until Saturday night when the brackets are released.

Northern beat softball 12-2 as the Lady Gryphon's complete a imperfect season going 0 for the season. Their last chance for a win is Monday in the conference softball tournament being held at Glover Park in Nashville.

Girls soccer after knocking of Northern in Wednesday night's semi finals of the Big East soccer tournament played Fike tonight for the championship. Text messages and facebook, I do not have a score yet. When I find out I will update.