Nobdy

Brent Stockstill's leg injury during football season is public information so I do not mind repeating that injury. He may not get to play at all this baseball season. The other injury that I have been told about may or may not be public, or even as serious as I was told, so I will not give out a name but he is a key player and it will be hard to replace him if true

Oakland lost two starters from last year. Third base and center field. Stacy will probably start at third this year but I do not know who they have for center field this year. i think they will have holes in their outfield. Their hitting last year was only strong against average pitching and seemed to disappear when they faced the better pitchers towards the end of last season. They really miss Brennan King as their hitting coach. Most of Oakland's starting pitching rotation (or who i think will start... Ward, Newman Hawkins) are also position players and also need to be in the batting lineup. That makes it very hard on those pitchers in a three game series and for the long haul of a season to not get burned out. I hope I am wrong but for those reasons I think Riverdale and Siegel will end up winning again.

I would have said before football season that it was between Riverdale and Siegel to win the division again with Siegel having the edge with their pitching. However, with Siegel's injury's I now will have to go with Riverdale having the edge. So my prediction for 7AAA is: Riverdale Siegel (assuming they will be able to overcome their injuries) Oakland Smyrna Blackman Lavergne I think the pitching for Riverdale will give them the edge again and they can always hit. Siegel will have good pitching but are not as strong without Stockstill. Oakland has the potential to move up the rankings but I think they will struggle on offense and may struggle with having enough strong pitching for a 3 game series. I am not really sure about Smyrna but they had a good season last year. Blackman has a lot to prove this year after last year but they have a new coach and hopefully a new enthusiasm.

I'll take a stab at the top teams this year in 7AAA. I think Riverdale will be the team to beat. I believe they have the largest senior class and most if not all of the Seniors have been playing together since middle school, but they will have to have some underclassmen step up and fill some critical spots. I believe Smyrna will have the best shot at coming in second or possibly first if Riverdale does not gel this year. I do not know all the players but they were a tough team last year and should get better this year. After those two teams it really a toss up. Coach Reavis seems to always pull together a good Siegel team but I think they will be hurting for enough Pitching this year. The same can be said for Blackman. Oakland is young, with only a few returning players with varsity experience. However if the younger players are able to step up and hit (they have some talent) Oakland may be a sleeper team because they do have a few good Pitchers returning that have experience. Lavergne lost their ace pitcher last year and I do not know if they have anyone to replace him.

Are you talking about the Oakland Patriots? If you are then you must be one of the young players that may have the opportunity to play this year without any experience. You should count your blessings for the opportunity but it is probably going to be a long season. In my opinion you only have one Senior, one Junior and two Sophmore's that are ready to play at that level (one of the Sophmore's is a pitcher only).

If they are from Oakland it would not be Coach Reavis they would be complaining about, so it must be a disgruntled mom.

Obviously you didnt notice that there has not been much talking at all from 7AAA. I think we are content to do our talking on the field. Hope to see you there!

If a curveball is thrown properly and in the correct number of pitches (20% to 25% of total pitches), throwing a curveball is no more harmful to a pitchers arm (no matter what age) than any other pitch. The problem is that most coaches have not taught or do not know themselves how to teach the kids the proper way of throwing a curveball safely. If you are correct and the Nitro coaches believe throwing with a 12-6 arm slot keeps from hurting the childs arm, then you are right those coaches do not know have a clue how to safely throw a curve ball. What can hurt a childs arm is not the arm path (12-6 or 2-8) but the twisting motion the kids use to get the ball to "spin" while throwing a curve ball. When any person throws a baseball your hand automatically pronates after you release the ball, when a pitcher twists his arm during the throwing motion to get the ball to spin he is putting a tremendous amount of stress on his elbow and then he releases and the hand will pronate in the opposite direction. It is that severe twisting motion while throwing that hurts the elbow of the pitcher. I am sure that most Dad's would not have any problem at all letting your 9 year old sons hit nails with a hammer. If thrown correctly, a curveball is basically the same motion. The keys are to teach the kids to "Pre-Set" their hands with the ball in their glove prior to throwing the pitch. This allows the hand and arm to be at the same angle as they will be at release point (ie for the curve ball it is basically a karate chop with butt of the hand facing the webbing of the glove) and then have the pitcher throw the pitch without changing arm angles through out the entire pitching motion. The Karate chop hand and arm angle will provide the spin to allow the ball to break. Finally do not allow a Coach to call for more than two or three curve balls in a row without throwing a fastball. The proper ratio of pitches is 60% fastballs, 20-25% curveballs and 15-20% change-ups. The problem with not teaching the kids to throw a curveball properly is that most will throw it anyway with their friends when they are just fooling around and most will throw it incorrectly. Secondly, many young kids twist their arms as they throw a baseball because they have not been taught how to properly hold a baseball and/or release it. As a result I have seen many kids, most not even pitchers, with hurt elbows at a young age just by throwing to a friend.

I couldnt help from asking how "Hip strength" was an issue? All that I can think of is your saying he doesnt lift his posting leg high enough due to poor hip flexor strength. I have never seen Gant throw, but if he is even close to the MPH everyone is indicating I found it very hard to believe he has an issue with lifting his posting leg. Also how could his foot placement on the rubber be an issue with him getting picked up by a college team? First, it should only take two seconds to find out exactly where he needs to place his foot on the rubber and fix it for him. And by the way that spot is specific to each individual pitcher. So what did you see that made you think he was standing in the wrong spot on the rubber? I would really like to hear your answer because if your right and the kid has an issue with consistently throwing the ball down the middle of the plate, that is a strong indication he is standing exactly where he needs to be on the rubber.

Only half the folks know that - LOL! That little white thing laying about 10 feet to the left was the baseball I hope Hargis is just sore and will be fine for next week - and congratulations to Coach Hawkes! I too thought at first that "white thing" 10 feet to his left was the ball, but I was wrong. It was his hat that flew off when he hit the fence! If you remember the umpire went out and looked at the CF, while he was still laying on the ground, and he called the batter out and told everyone the ball was in his glove at that time. (He later changed his call because the CF had taken the glove off his hand). If that had been the ball 10 feet to his left, someone would have had to pick it up and put in in his glove while we all watched and before the umpire checked on the CF. The LF did go over to look to see if the CF was ok, but he went right past the white thing laying on the ground without picking it up to check on the CF. I was upset and wondering why he didnt pick it up and throw it back in to stop the play. I later saw that it was the CF's hat and not the ball.

Your right my post does mistakenly indicate that GOOD Pitchers should be able to consistently throw all three pitches for strikes. I did not intend to write it that way but was really trying to say that is what the Good pitchers should be working towards. If they do achieve command of all three pitches and can throw for strikes consistently then they will be the Elite pitchers and should be able to pitch in College and perhaps make it to the Pros. However, the good news is that High School Pitchers do not have throw the curve or changeup consistently for strikes, they only have to show those pitches to the batters to keep them off balance (assuming they do not tip those pitches by changing their delivery and release point). Hitting is all about timing and pitching is all about disrupting that timing. The faster a kid throws the fastball the less differential is required between the fastball and the offspeed pitches to disrupt the batters timing. The slower the kid throws his fastball the more of a differential is required.

I am sure you did not mean it this way, but I get so tired of reading about velocity as an indicator as to how well kids pitch. If all a pitcher can only throw is a fastball in the mid 80's or even 90's without a good curveball or changeup, they will get hit and hit hard at this level. Pitchers in High School that are "good" (and can even become great) have control of at least 3 or more pitches that they can throw for strikes, from the same release point ("tunneling"), with an effective change in velocity of 6mph or more between pitches. If a kid can do that he will be almost un-hittable. Unfortunately all we do now is look at the radar gun and talk about how fast the kids are registering on the gun. As if that will tell us how good the pitchers are or how good they will become.

Not sure when you last saw Zack Taylor pitch but you are wrong about his fastball not being over 80 and he has a good curve ball. From what I have seen he just needs to be able to throw the curve for a strike in pressure situations on command. I think he will surprise you this coming season if he is given an opportunity. I agree with Southpaw...I have never seen Stevie throw 90, but I was not at East Cobb tournament this past summer. However, I did see him pitch many times this past year.

What do you think will make him stand out?

I wouldn't know personally, but from a couple of parents/players i've talked to they said it hasn't been as tough as previous years under Coach Pharr. But i guarantee their definition of "hard" and everyone else's is different. I am giving you your chance. Help me understand Farragut's definition of "hard". Please let me know how Farragut has trained in the past that makes them head and shoulders above everyone else (at least in your mind). What is their definition of "Hard"? Please tell me why you would ask such a question? WHY? Now we will be bombarded with days of Farragut DRIBBLE! To be honest it was just to see if FarragutUniversity really knew anything about baseball or just a stats kind of person. I received the answer I expected, which was no answer, so I will dismiss his Dribble in the future.