J's final High school Game

J'Kyra Brown playing in her last high school game representing Rocky Mount High school Brown scored with 40 seconds to play on a rebound at the defensive end and took it all the way for a lay up and in doing so helped to secure a 67-60 East victory over the west in the annual East/West High school girls basketball game play in the Greensboro Coliseum Monday night.  J'Kyra along with two east teammates each had 12 points in the game to lead the way.  Kelsey Daniels scored two points in the game giving the Gryphons a total of 14 for the night.

There have been some players dropping out of the East/West All Star football  game Wednesday night and  Justin Ferrell from Southwest Edgecombe has been added to the roster. Players from this area that are playing besides Ferrell are Travonne Marshall Tarboro High and Jerod Richardson from Nash Central.

Tuesday night belongs to the soccer as two players and a coach from the Twin County area are in Greensboro taking part in the all star festivities this week during the NC High School Coaches Association meetings being held this week in Greensboro.  Southern Nash will have Carlos Levin on the east squad along with Tarboro's Travis Martin.  The East will be coached by Tarboro's Leshaun Jenkins.

Friday begins the State American Legion State Tournament in Wilson.  It all begins at 9:30 Friday Morning when Kernersville open play against the area four winner which is being played tonight.  The 12:30 will have Randolph County taking on the runner up in area four.  The opening ceremonies will be held at 3:30 Friday afternoon and then at 4:30 Garner will go up against Jacksonville.  The finale of the night will Have Post 13 from Wilson who has a losing record on the year play Wilmington Post 10 at 7:30.

Like to congratulate Nash County Babe Ruth 13U team winning the eastern State Championship and by doing so has earned a spot in the Southeast Regional in Tennessee August 1st.  I know in the last 10 years Nash County has made it all the way to the World Series at least  three times.  Twice it was held in Wilson with the last year being 2006 and 2005 making it to the World series finishing second in Quincy Ma. I have no connections with anyone on this team at all and sure would love to get someone to advise me how I can keep up with their progress as they continue their adventure.

Lefty Has All The Right Shots

I don't know if you are like me or not but if I happen to have had any contact with a professional athlete at all I tend to like them and pull for them.  If they went to a school in North Carolina is the second way that I pull for athletes regardless of the sport.  I have never met Phil Mickelson and when he came up and joined the tour he was maybe third on on list of people I like and didn't know.  I liked David Duval and Justin Leonard and then Lefty.  So this probably makes them 10th on my list of players I pull for.  Davis Love, Curtis Strange those guys all went to school here so they are ahead of Duval, Leonard and Mickelson.

Time passes and you have to admire the way life has unfolded for Lefty.  He  left practice at the US Open this year to fly home to see one of his daughters graduate middle school and fly back all night and led the Open after the first day.  His wife had breast cancer and he took time off from the tour to be with her.He just seems to have life figured out that golf pays the bills but the most important thing in life his his family.

It was one of the U S Opens played at Pinehurst where Mickelson's wife was about to give birth and he had a beeper set the second it went off to drop out of the U S Open and fly home.  Mickelson just seems to understand there is more to life than hitting that itty bitty ball.

Sunday watching as Lefty's caddy "Bones" Mackay break down and cry  for his boss winning the British Open.  This is Michelson 5th major not his first  but MacKay cried as if it was the first.  There just has to be something special about Phil Michelson that the people who are around him every day feel that the way they do for him.

How many times after a big one like Sunday has Phil's family been there to enjoy it with him.  I think we all have moments in our life when it is even better to have someone you love  there to share the moment with you.  The way he has conducted himself Phil Mickelson has moved up my list to just behind Webb Simpson(Wake) golfer as my favorite.  I wish more athletes understood there is more to life than winning at all cost.

Garner wrapped up the Area One Legion Championship last night beating Pitt County 12-2.  Garner will represent eastern North Carolina along with Wilson when the State American Legion Baseball Tournament begins this weekend at fleming Stadium.

When Is it Time To Hang'um Up

Derek Jeter has been Mr New York since 1995.  For the most part his career has been injury free and then he hit that over 35 years old and a broken ankle has turned into a pulled muscle.  What will be next for  one of the only players in the last 20 years that has never had a hint of the word steroid mentioned.  The Yankees are old and need to clean house.  It is hard to do to a person that has been the face of the Yankees for almost 20 years.

NFL  training camps are starting today for some but by the end of the week football will be back.  I think it is 13 more days for those glorious preseason games get started.  Colleges  start football around Aug 1st through 5th.  Labor Day weekend is six weeks away.

Garner Saturday afternoon beat Pitt County 5-4  to take a two games to none lead in the Area One American Legion Title.  They can punch their ticket to Wilson Today at Garner High.  PC has to win three in a row to continue their season.

J'Kyra Brown plays her last high school basketball game Monday night at the Greensboro Coliseum.  another Gryphon Kelsey Daniels is a replacement and this gives the Lady Gryphons two players in the girls game.  Soccer is Tuesday and the football East West game is Wednesday night.  The North Carolina Coaches clinics  start Monday in Greensboro.

Don't care whether he is no longer the Tiger Woods of ten years ago or not the final round of the British Open will probably be the most watched Open of all time.  Tiger may win Sunday but he has lost that aura he once had that players look over their shoulder to see where he is.  Would not shock me if his partner Adam Scott Sunday wins it all. I like watching all the majors.  The Open looks like it is played in a pasture that they moved the cows or sheep last week and dug some holes in the ground and hollered FORE.

Big Time Money And Social Media

I think I can solve a lot of this world's problem with people who win lotteries and athlete who get millions of dollars just because they run fast.   First of all let's do away with the lottery winner can take cash.  If all lottery winners had to wait one year to get the next check they might not spend it all in one weekend. They would have something to look forward to knowing another check comes in eleven months since I have spent the last one already.

If I won 10 million I just can't buy but so many houses and cars and there is still plenty more. I don't think people understand how much 10 million is. What do all these people do with all that money?  As far as pro athletes are concern if they sign a contract for millions I say let them have say as a rookie $50,000 and put the rest where they have to get a monthly check for the rest of their lives.  70% of all NFL players are broke three years after they get out of football.  What do they do with their money?

 Since this country is so into letting the government give me a check every month I think any person who makes more than the President of the United States ought to have to put his money in a government savings account and by the time he is retired he can live off his money the government has been sitting on. I understand that this method is a trust in the government that they will not steal it from you. 

This blog is social media and I give my opinions sometimes that people don't agree with.  I try to keep this as positive as possible so people who agree with you tend to not comment. The ones that don't tend to be the first to hit the send button.  The new wave of social media is tweeting where everyone who can afford a cell phone can now be followed by signing up and getting accepted by the person tweeting.  I have to much to say to say it in 50 words or less.

Kids have twitter accounts now  that I know they have nothing worth waiting for them to tell me so please don't count on me to view your twitter.   I can't stand to watch a sports show on TV and I have to watch all the comments coming in on twitter.  Please start a channel just for Tweets only.  I can see it now a channel right next to the Discovery Channel.  The tweet channel the only way to get on is to tweet a comment and see it on national TV.

I bet the average person doesn't know the laws regarding cell phones, tweeting or any other method of reaching the masses.  I am of the opinion that when the day comes that a blog on the internet is old fashion and nobody goes there any more it will be time to stop this any way.  The way this world changes that might be next week.

Garner Beat Pitt County in the first game of the Area One Championships in Garner last night by scoring three runs in the bottom of the ninth inning.  The final was 6-5, game two is at noon today at LeClair Stadium at ECU.  Garner is up 1-0 in this series where the winner gets a spot in the State American Legion Baseball tournament which starts July 25th in Wilson

Post 58 Saves The Day

You may have seen the high lights of the Pitt County Post 39 victory over Post 13 from Wilson Thursday on Greenville TV.  PC won to sweep the series 3 games to none.  Game three was played in Rocky Mount at Legion Field.  You see with the State Legion Tournament starting next weekend in Wilson the Wilson Tobs are playing more home games right now due to the fact they will not be able to play there for about a week.  When you compound that Wilson's other potential fields for Post 13 are muddy from all the rains up steps Post 58 to offer Legion field which was acceptable to both teams.  Too bad nobody knew about it ahead of time.

Pitt County will play Garner who beat Johnston County three games to one and the winner of that series will join Wilson July 25th when the State Tournament starts at Fleming in Wilson.  Already Morehead City and Wilmington have won the area two slots and will be coming to Wilson.

Hobbs Johnson pitched two more innings in Helena Montana and this time he gives up his first run that is earned.  His first four innings of his pro career he has allowed six hits, one earned run and struck out 3.  That is an ERA of 2.25 which is about where he was a Carolina.

I don't know whether he is injured or not but the X man Xavier Macklin has not batted for Vermont in the last week so he is still batting 208 in 24 bats.

Can you look at a minor leaguer's stats and tell what he means to his organization?  Brian  Goodwin is right now hanging at 254 batting average.  He has struck our 95 times in 93 games.  He has a total 28 extra base hits 13 doubles, 8 triples and 7 home runs.  Brian has batted more than 100 at bats more than any one else on the team.  He is playing every day.  You may remember last year when he first started in his minor league career that the Nationals said they wanted to give him about 1500 at bats in the minors.  If they want you on a certain track then you can't get an at bat sitting on the bench.

There is no doubt that since Debbie Yow has been at N C State she has found money under rocks that nobody knew money was there.  That old hay barn called Reynolds Coliseum is going to be renovated in 2015.  Women's basketball, Wrestling, Volleyball  and all of the ROTC programs will be booted out while the remodeling is done.  The old barn is getting a 34 million dollar upgrade.  I sure do hope they put Air conditioning in it.

The Baseball Pipeline

Rocky Mount Parks and Recreation will send multiple teams to the Tar Heel State Championships.  Five teams from 7 to 12 years of age took part in this weeks district six tournament played in Rocky Mount.  Two won their division, two others finished second and one of those lost out to another Rocky Mount team and the last team finished third.  The Rocky Mount area continues to put quality teams on the field when they hit the playoffs.

If you consider the two senior league teams that is 24 players that the recreation department has sent into the Tar Heel Tournaments. You must remember that not of these all stars are 12 as two or 3 are 11 years old.  All Stars teams to a certain degree are like the regular season teams.  All teams have three players that could play on any team they are just that good.  Then there are about five that are good ball players and three that when they face other all star pitchers ride the pine in the playoffs.

Now players come from all over to play in Rocky Mount so when these all stars make their way up to high school those 12 players are divided just in Nash County by six high schools.  Throw in one or two that might be playing at SouthWest, Tarboro or even North Edgecombe those all stars at 12 years of age are scattered all over the place depending on what school district they live or private school they attend.

It has been 2008 since any Rocky Mount area high school won the state title in baseball and since then not many have advanced very deep into the playoffs.  Yes the city of Rocky Mount provides plenty of players  that as they progress through high school they are extremely good high school players.  In order to make a state champion in high school there must be a year when they all seem to go to the same school.  When you look at the college players  that team put out in 2008 more than half the team played D-1 baseball and higher.

Of course if we want to win the State High school baseball championship every year the answer is built a county high school with 5,000 students where just about every player who went through the little league program stay together in high school.  Obviously only 16 or so could play high school ball that way so the answer in not a bigger school.  We want as many of our children to have extra circular activities in school as possible.  Crime statistics show a child that is idle is the one committing the crimes.

So we must wait for the next time when one of our high schools gets an extra amount of extra special players to help lead them to another state title.  Who knows those  7/8,9/10,11/12 year old representing us in Williamston just might be the next crop of state champions once they hit high school.

Rocky Mount Wins Two District Titles

 Last night I made a trip out to the sports complex to see where the District Six Tar Heel Little League tournament was going on.  Since my attention has been with Legion and that is over if there was going to be a Rocky Mount team still playing WHIG-TV would video a game if any were available to do Tuesday.  Sure enough the National League Senior Little league all stars had to lose twice Tuesday to not win the District.

WHIG-TV was there tonight to do that game when we found out that by 10:30 Last night (Monday)that the Midgette National League All Stars from Rocky Mount had knocked off the American League Rocky Mount team to create a winner take all final tonight.  Two Rocky Mount teams playing with only one that can make it to the State Championships  why lets switch and do the 9/10 year old final.

Since the 11/12 year old game  Rocky Mount Nationals had to lose once to create a winner take all we chose two Rocky Mount teams over one.  Glad we did.  The Rocky Mount National Senior team beat  Zebulon 12-0 and Zebulon only batted three times.  Yes there is the mercy Rule when you have a ten run lead after four innings in little league but the also have the 12 run rule after three.  Rocky Mount never batted in the third.  Zebulon didn't have a chance today.

The National league is coached by Donnie Whitley with his assistance Sam Toler who must have more state titles than any coach in North Carolina.  Paul Legaj and Jeff Robison will all help lead this team all the way to Willaimston on July 25th.  Rocky Mount gets a wildcat in the first game as they will play the host Williamston.

The 9/10 year old game the RM American stuck for three runs in the first and never got a hit.  The National all stars pecked away getting two in the second.  The hit of the night occurred when the bases were loaded when Coleston Dempsey hit a one hopper off the wall to clear the bases and give his team a 5-3 lead which they would never surrender the lead.  The Americans cut it to 5-4 but by the games end Rocky Mount Nationals  Midgette team is headed to the State Championship  and Rocky Mount American's dreams are shattered. after a 13-8 win.

7/8 year old coach pitch team lost in 9 innings the district championship but in their division the #2 and 3 teams also get in and Rocky Mount joins Wendell Blue  and Wendell white as the three teams from District 6 playing in the Tar Heel State championships.  Rocky Mount rec has won 7 state titles since 1991 and three more teams will try to get a plaque on the wall of champions heading into the little league end of the sports complex.