Region 3A

[Crowder10]

Let's get some early season predictions.......I think that in the Region 3A semifinals you have

Lookout Valley beating either Copper Basin or Silverdale

and

Grace beating CSAS

 

Lookout Valley is returning 8 out of its 9 starters (loosing only their catcher) from its State Tournament team last year and from what i have heard are looking very strong this year.

 

CSAS- i don't really know a whole lot except for they lost Matt Jones, Nick Peppers maybe and a few others, but they still have James Dickson and a few others, any insight would be good.

 

Grace- they will win their district for a 3rd straight year w/o much trouble. They have a pretty tough out of district/region schedule playing teams like Oak Ridge, Boyd Buchanan, Marion County, Polk County, Ridgeland, and Ooltewah. They willl also be a host site for the Ooltewah Invitational and also playing in the Mountain/Valley Invitational. They lost five seniors last year but are bringing back five seniors, most noteably, a considered top-area-prospect in shortstop/pitcher Wallace Foster. The key for Grace is going to be pitching, they are very young in the rotation as far as experience goes, in fact they are pretty young in experience in all aspects, but have LOADS of talent. I believe that if this team does what they know they can do, they can get over the "region semi-final hump" and beat CSAS to advance to the region championship against lookout valley and go play in a sub state game.

 

what do you all think?

[catsbackr]

what do you all think?

 

I think Lookout Valley will win this Region in an absolute cake walk.

 

And I also think Ooltewah could have chosen a much better facility to help them host their tournament. Grace's field is terrible.

[cedarridge]

Lookout Valley will easily win the region

 

in the semifinals though my predictions are:

 

lookout valley beating grace or silverdale

 

csas beating temple

[govols78]

Have you been to Grace's field in the last two years? It has been drastically upgraded, and helped host the Ooltewah Invitational last year. Every team there said it was one of the best fields they played on all year. Adairsville High's coach said his pitchers loved the mound and wished they could pitch on it every day.

 

 

I think Lookout Valley will win this Region in an absolute cake walk.

 

And I also think Ooltewah could have chosen a much better facility to help them host their tournament. Grace's field is terrible.

[Took]

who all is getting looked at from lookout valley?

[Crowder10]

thank you go vols, Grace's field has been worked on a lot and looks great this year. and as far as the region predictions go, Valley won't play Grace in the semi-finals b/c its the Winner of Distrcit 5 (which will be Grace) plays the loser of District 6 (which i think will be CSAS) and the Winner of District 6 (Valley) will play the loser of District 5 (Copper or Silverdale). It would be a good thought, but i just do not see Valley choking against CSAS in District Championship game. Valley has too much fire power and bats to loose in an important game like that.

[catsbackr]

Have you been to Grace's field in the last two years? It has been drastically upgraded, and helped host the Ooltewah Invitational last year. Every team there said it was one of the best fields they played on all year. Adairsville High's coach said his pitchers loved the mound and wished they could pitch on it every day.

 

I was at Grace last year and the field was average at best.

 

If the teams that played there thought it was one of the best they played on all year, they must not have played at Red Bank, Hixson, Soddy Daisy, Ooltewah, Baylor, McCallie, Seq. Co., Marion Co., Grundy Co. or Rhea Co. This isn't a slight to Grace's progam, it just surprises me that Ooltewah would partner with them is all.

 

Anyway, back on the original topic, Grace should win District 5 in a walk. This district is so weak with Temple, Silverdale, David Brainerd, 21st Century, Copper Basin. 5AA is very weak also. Makes you wonder why. Grace will probably advance to the Regionals, then lose to Lookout Valley. Loukout Valley should be back in the Boro.

 

Best of luck to all the teams.

[Iroot4vols]

I was at Grace last year and the field was average at best.

 

If the teams that played there thought it was one of the best they played on all year, they must not have played at Red Bank, Hixson, Soddy Daisy, Ooltewah, Baylor, McCallie, Seq. Co., Marion Co., Grundy Co. or Rhea Co. This isn't a slight to Grace's progam, it just surprises me that Ooltewah would partner with them is all.

 

Anyway, back on the original topic, Grace should win District 5 in a walk. This district is so weak with Temple, Silverdale, David Brainerd, 21st Century, Copper Basin. 5AA is very weak also. Makes you wonder why. Grace will probably advance to the Regionals, then lose to Lookout Valley. Loukout Valley should be back in the Boro.

 

Best of luck to all the teams.

 

 

I got a question for you. How can you post this comment and then complain about the LV tourney and the distance between those fields? All the fields you've posted on here are still a good drive away from Ooltewah and yet you think they should have used one of these schools that are obviously much farther...especially Hixon;).

I was actually at one of the games during last year's Invitational and it actually went very well. And I'm not saying Grace has the nicest looking field in town, but it's clearly obvious their field is much better than it's been in the past and a nice enough field to host this Invitational. They for sure have on of the top mounds in the area, mostly because they have to rebuild it after sharing it with football and I did hear other schools talk about the mound after the game.

That said, best of luck to everyone and look forward to seeing some good baseball this year.

[catsbackr]

I got a question for you. How can you post this comment and then complain about the LV tourney and the distance between those fields? All the fields you've posted on here are still a good drive away from Ooltewah and yet you think they should have used one of these schools that are obviously much farther...especially Hixon;).

I was actually at one of the games during last year's Invitational and it actually went very well. And I'm not saying Grace has the nicest looking field in town, but it's clearly obvious their field is much better than it's been in the past and a nice enough field to host this Invitational. They for sure have on of the top mounds in the area, mostly because they have to rebuild it after sharing it with football and I did hear other schools talk about the mound after the game.

That said, best of luck to everyone and look forward to seeing some good baseball this year.

 

Post what comment? The Lookout Valley/Gordon Lee site thing is not even on this topic. However, they are still about 20-25 miles apart. I just thought that was a long way apart for teams sharing a tournament. I didn't know it was only the 1st round at Gordon Lee, now I know. Don't mix topics.

 

All I said regarding the Ooltewah tournament was I was surprised they didn't get a site with a better field. And if they chose ANY other site of the ones I mentioned, they still aren't 20-25 miles from Ooltewah.

 

Grace's field may be much better than it was in the past. Bad is an improvement over terrible. Average is better than bad. It still is very average at best. And it's not real hard to have a great mound if you rebuild it every year. Their field is much better than CSAS, Sale Creek and Tyner. Congrats.

[Iroot4vols]

Post what comment? The Lookout Valley/Gordon Lee site thing is not even on this topic. However, they are still about 20-25 miles apart. I just thought that was a long way apart for teams sharing a tournament. I didn't know it was only the 1st round at Gordon Lee, now I know. Don't mix topics.

 

All I said regarding the Ooltewah tournament was I was surprised they didn't get a site with a better field. And if they chose ANY other site of the ones I mentioned, they still aren't 20-25 miles from Ooltewah.

 

Grace's field may be much better than it was in the past. Bad is an improvement over terrible. Average is better than bad. It still is very average at best. And it's not real hard to have a great mound if you rebuild it every year. Their field is much better than CSAS, Sale Creek and Tyner. Congrats.

 

 

I was just replying to two different comments you had said that in a way contradict eachother...though I know one comment was on another board but I was actually replying to you complaining about Grace's field. I do know that a couple of those schools you mentioned aren't 25 miles from Ooltewah, but some are much more and the others are pretty close...Hixon would still take a good 20-25 minutes from Ooltewah if your team were a host school for example (and you do have a nice field BTW).

 

Grace's field- playing service is good being its all grass infield, the grass in the outfield nice, dugouts large, the new fence looks really good (tons better than the fence they had a couple years ago), and the mound is obviously one of the best to pitch off of since it has to be built each year (which is probably the most important for a field). So what else do you want? Does the fact that we don't have acres of foul territory make it a bad field? BTW, they also have a new press box at Grace behind home plate.

 

I'm not going to disagree with your post about other schools having better fields, but I wouldn't put Grace's field so far below other schools. That is like me saying your field is terrible since it doesn't look like Ridgeland's "college stadium".

 

That said, I will say you guys did a good job getting the field ready for that Hixon day Saturday. I made it to one of the games and you guys did a good job getting it ready after the weather. How come ya'll forgot to turn the heat on that day?

[catsbackr]

As a public school, unfortunately we didn't have the money for the heat. The HCDE has to heat the magnet schools first.

 

I'm anxious to see your field this year. Good luck.

 

(Also, I haven't been affiliated with Hixson baseball program for years.)

[Jacket34]

Grace's field is terrible....TERRIBLE. You might as well just build a mound on a football field and throw down a few bases. Oh wait, that's what it is - a football field with bases! Red Bank, Hixson, or Soddy would be much better choices.