The Starting Five

Took some time in Sunday at the Mid-Atlantic Baseball Classic at Municipal Stadium and had the opportunity to talk with one of the top Tri-State area baseball players who was not in action Sunday.

With his team getting ready for the West Virginia Class AAA state semifinals on Thursday in Charleston against Logan, Brandon King could not play but was in attendance and I was able to clarify what I had been hearing for a few weeks.

For about two years now, King has been a University of Tennessee signed, sealed and delivered recruit. That is not going to happen. The senior righthand pitcher and offensive slugging machine will NOT be a Tennessee Volunteer. By mutual agreement he has received his scholarship release from UT and is now looking to make a decission elsewhere, one he hopes can be made by August 1. Whether he is able to nab a full scholarship is to be seen, but he said he has had contact with Maryland, Penn State, West Virgina and Virginia.

It appeared throughout his junior season that UT was not happy with his progress. Along the same lines, King had suffered an arm injury that prohibited him from maintaining what had been consistent pitching above the 90 mph mark. His hitting has never suffered and he told me that he has regained his arm strength during his senior season and is back up around the 91-to-94 mph range.

Today is do-or-die day for Clear Spring and North Hagerstown in the West Region finals. Clear Spring hosts Catoctin in the 1A finale and North goes to Walkersville in the 2A tilt. Both games at 4:30.

Clear Spring (15-2) will be coming off its huge win over Smithsburg on Wednesday with a walkoff homer from Josh Green for a 6-5 victory. Catoctin (15-4) has won 10 of its last 11 games — the only loss to Smithsburg on April 29. Catoctin owns a 10-8 victory over Clear Spring during the regular season. The winner moves on to the state semifinals Tuesday at McCurdy Field in Frederick against the New Town-Sparrows Point winner.

The Cinderella story is attached to North Hagerstown, making an atempt to beat Walkersville for the third time this year. The Hubs (7-10-1) are coming off a 4-0 win over Middletown while Walkersville (10-8) beat Liberty 8-7 in 13 innings, a game that finished Thursday. Walkersville has won 6 games in a row and has not lost since April 27 when North’s Greg Lynn tossed a shutout in the Hubs’ 6-0 victory. The winner moves on to the state semis Tuesday at Arundel High School against the winner of today’s Eastern Tech-Loch Raven game.

Hooray … no weather problems on Friday and after the results, here is the lineup for Monday’s quarterfinal round. Times to be announced, but I’m guessing all of them will be 4:45.

1A — Allegany at Clear Spring; Poolesville at Smithsburg; Catoctin at Brunswick; Southern Garrett at Northern Garrett.

2A — North Hagerstown at Century; South Hagerstown at Walkersville; Rockville at Middletown; Liberty at Winters Mill.

In case you missed it here are Friday’s scores: Allegany 6, Boonsboro 4; Poolesville 5, Williamsport 4; Catoctin 6, Mountain Ridge 3; Southern Garrett 11, Hancock 4; South Hagerstown 11, Northwood 1; North Hagerstown 3, Francis Scott Key 2.

Here they are — the prep baseball pairings in Maryland:

Class 1A — Southern Garrett at Hancock; Poolesville at Williamsport; Allegany at Boonsboro (to be played Friday). Clear Spring was the No. 2 seed and will play the Boonsboro-Allegany winner on Monday. Smithsburg was the No. 3 seed at will play the Williamsport-Poolesville winner on Monday.

Smithsburg got the 3-seed because Southern Garrett had not played the reqired 14 non-tournament game schedule for seeding. I’m sure the Southern folks are thrilled about also getting an away game to begin the tournament.

Class 2A –Francis Scott Key at North Hagerstown; Northwood at South Hagerstown, both on Friday.

BTW — Today at 4:45 Clear Spring is playing at Smithsburg … looks like the field will be ready and hope the rain stays away.

Clear Spring was in major need of playing a baseball game today.
The brackets for the upcoming boys state tournament would be filled out on Wednesday and the Blazers were 1 game short of the minimum requirement of 14 non-tournament games be played to be eligible for a seeded position.
The Blazers had a makeup game with Williamsport scheduled for Monday at Clear Spring but that game was wiped out. Williamsport also had a game Tuesday at home against Smithsburg and the Williamsport field drains pretty well.

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GAMES POSTPONED IN THE COUNTY — Williamsport at Clear Spring, Boonsboro at Smithsburg, North vs. South. The North-South game will NOT be rescheduled. No word on the others. Dare I say Tuesday’s schedule might be in danger as it continues to rain and the forecast is not promising. It may get to the point some schools won’t play another game until the tournament.
Monday’s postponements now pose huge problems in the MVAL Antietam race and potential seeding in the upcoming 1A tournament in baseball. The last date for seeding purposes is Tuesday, the drawing is Wednesday, the last regular-season play date is Thursday and the tournament begins Friday.
After today, there is room for only 3 games IF everyone played 3 straight days. That won’t happen leading into the tournament. Clear Spring has 4 MVAL games left, Smithsburg and Catoctin 3 each counting Monday. So, something will be canceled and much will be shuffled.
Scheduled for Tuesday are Smithsburg at Williamsport and Clear Spring at Catoctin. One previous postponement — Clear Spring at Smithsburg — has not been made up.
It’s a mess and we’ll see what ingenuity comes in rescheduling in order to get some games in before the tournament. Of course, we need some cooperation from Mother Nature.

Just got a note on Monday’s North Hagerstown-South Hagerstown baseball game.

Originally scheduled to be played at North High, the game will be played at Municipal Stadium at 7 p.m. South High personnel will handle the details as host, but North High will be the home team on the diamond.

Tickets will be $4 for adults and $2 for students ….. that’s Monday, May 4 at the Stadium at 7 p.m.

One day, 30 degrees difference, the show must go on.

And that they did on Wednesday afternoon under an ominous sky that produced a mist throughout but did not keep Smithsburg and Catoctin from an excellent baseball game.

In the end, it was Josh Conway’s 11-strikeout performance in front of onlooking scouts that helped lead Smithsburg to a 6-2 MVAL Antietam victory.

The win gave Smithsburg a 5-2 Antietam record and dropped Catoctin to 5-2. Clear Spring beat Boonsboro to move to 4-1. With time running out on the regular season, Clear Spring still has five MVAL games to play while Smithsburg and Catoctin each have three. The last play date is May 7. At this time, all games remaining have a date set except for the Smithsburg-Clear Spring finale.

Thursday, Clear Spring plays at Williamsport (weather permitting). Friday, Smithsburg is at Williamsport, Clear Spring is at Brunswick and Boonsboro is at Catoctin, also weather permitting and the forecast is ‘iffy.’ Saturday will need to be a makeup day if any of these games get washed away.

Thank you, thank you, thank you ….. a great sun-filled Saturday.

It all started with an early-morning round of golf , and not content ot be one that was going to spend the rest of the day in front of the tube, it was off to a nearby prep baseball game where I caught up with St. Maria Goretti playing Hedgesville. I also planned on catching Williamsport play Boonsboro in the evening at Municipal Stadium.

Yeah, yeah, what a way to spend a day off from work.

I caught up with the Goretti game in the fourth inning and by the time it was over Hedgesville had pulled out an 18-16 win in 8 innings.

OK … catch my breath, cold beverage at home inbetween and then over to the stadium and proceed to watch an excruciating long game in which Williamsport pulled out an 11-10 win over Boonsboro  for its first win of the year.

A great night to watch a prep baseball game and it was fairly-well atttended.

And good to see that Scott Mowbray and Chris Malott can do more than coach basketball — they set up the concessions and had a hand in the pregame festivities that included a tribute to fallen Williamsport grad Nick Adenhart.

Well done and a wonderful Saturday.

Enough! The rain we’ve been getting has come on heavily-scheduled prep events days and Monday is no exception — including an important Antietam matchup with Clear Spring at Smithsburg. It’s almost to the point that enough is enough.

As we near the latter part of April, it’s going to become more difficult to reschedule games for schools get in their full schedule.
Starting with Tuesday, there are only 17 available playing dates (including Saturday’s, excluding Sunday’s) until the last allowable play date (May 7) for Maryland schools. The drawings for the tournament are May 6.

This does not bode well for pitching staffs, and we all know most high school pitching staffs are not quality from top to bottom. As games mount up (if they do) you are going to see some high-scoring games.

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