Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, March 23, 1990 TAG: 9003221987
SECTION: CURRENT PAGE: NRV13 EDITION: NEW RIVER
SOURCE: RAY COX SPORTSWRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
Competitive balance has returned.
Don't count on Grayson County to recede quietly into oblivion. The Blue Devils should be right in the thick of the chase along with Fort Chiswell, Floyd County, Shawsville, Galax and Narrows. Auburn and Rocky Gap figure to be somewhat less powerful. Bland will take some thrashings as it starts from scratch with almost an entirely new team. The teams:
\ SHAWSVILLE: The Shawnees are hurting for certain, right?
Gone between the end of last season and the start of this is three-fourths of a talented infield.
Corey Epperly, a shortstop and the leading base stealer in Timesland last year, transferred to Salem. The other half of the double-play combination, sophomore Mike Sweeney, transferred to Christiansburg. Then Shawn Yates, the first baseman, hurt his left knee playing basketball and was lost for baseball.
Furthermore, Epperly and Sweeney were penciled in as the Nos. 1 and 2 pitchers.
Don't write the Shawnees' obituary just yet.
Reason No. 1: Catcher Tony Lovern batted .452 with 10 home runs (eight on the road) and 43 runs batted in last year.
Reason No. 2: Right-hander Scott Phillips, the sophomore who is the ace-apparent of the pitching staff now that Epperly is gone, tossed a no-hitter in his varsity debut last year.
Reason No. 3: Mark Sisson set a school record with 17 walks last year. Sisson knows strike zones.
Further cause for optimism is the seasoned Ricky Haga in center field and right-hander Danny Lovern and left-hander Robert Ryan, the rest of the Shawnee's all-sophomore rotation.
"People have been coming up to me and saying, `Isn't it awful that you lost all those players?' " Shawsville coach Billy Wells said. "It isn't that bad. I'm going to take what we do have. I'm looking forward to it."
\ FLOYD COUNTY: The Buffaloes are at the beginning of what very well could be a several-year run of success.
This team is loaded with promising sophomores. Those to watch include outfielder Mitch DeCosta, a transfer from Pulaski County, catcher Johnny Quesenberry, second baseman Jeremy Cox, and outfielders Jeff Bennett and Brian Horne.
"These boys have really looked promising," Floyd County coach Wes Starkey said.
But what about the oldsters on this team? The Buffs have them in all the right places.
Starkey welcomes back his top-three pitchers and his top-three hitters.
A year ago, Chris Wallace, Steve Agee and Dale Marshall combined for 51 runs batted in and four homers. Agee (.432) was the team's leading hitter. Marshall (.409, 19 RBI) the leading RBI guy. Wallace (.333) matched Marshall with a pair of homers.
Wallace and Marshall will swap back and forth between shortstop and the mound. A year ago, Wallace was 3-1 with a 5.00 earned run average and Marshall 3-5 with a 4.26 ERA and 40 strikeouts in 42 innings. Both are right handers.
The Buffs will be even stronger on the mound after left-hander Brady Ynetma recovers from a broken thumb on his pitching hand. He is expected back no sooner than midseason.
\ NARROWS: The outlook for the Green Wave mirrors that of so many teams. Narrows goes where its pitching leads.
"If the pitching comes through, we're probably middle-of-the-packers," Narrows coach Rick Franklin said.
Now that Franklin has put his mound staff on the spot, let's meet them:
There's right-hander Joe Ferrell, who was 4-1 with a 4.65 earned run average on a team that finished 9-6 and was the runner-up in the league tournament. Ferrell has an average fastball but good control and knows how to throw to spots. Right-hander Lester Sears, who played as a sophomore but not as a junior, is a control pitcher with a repertoire of breaking pitches.
Franklin is hoping that third baseman Chris McClaugherty can develop a pitching repertoire of any description. Ditto for lefty Ripper McGlothlin, who can hit (.333, one home run, 12 RBI), but can he hurl? Franklin will find out when McGlothlin's broken pinky finger on his left hand heals.
Narrows will be strong in the outfield with Mason Bragg (.357, one home run, 10 RBI) and Eddie Clark (.282, one home run, nine RBI) and speedy Rodney Perdue.
At shortstop, Narrows has lots of experience in junior Jon Bowman (three-year starter) but not much bat (never hit higher than .220). Bowman will improve on his experience; Franklin hopes he does the same with his hitting.
Franklin also has hopes for Tony Boggess, who is in his first year as a starter at catcher. In fact, Franklin is banking on Boggess because if he doesn't work out, then Perdue will have to be summoned from the outfield, and that would be a tremendous waste of all that speed.
\ AUBURN: The hope is that the Eagles will make a better showing than last year.
That may be a challenge, but one that this team appears ready to meet.
"We'll definitely do better than we did last year," said second-year coach Claude Miles, whose team's only 1989 victory came against winless Rocky Gap. "This year, we have some guys who have played baseball before. Last year, hardly anybody had. We had double-figures in errors in more than one game last year."
The Eagles' most experienced players include center fielder Jody Smith, outfielder/shortstop Kevin Hungate, shortstop Robbie Dalton and outfielder Jimmy Elkins. Dalton played two years ago and sat out the 1989 season.
The pitching is a question mark. Left-hander Chris Belcher, a sophomore transfer from Pulaski County, has been penciled in as the No. 1 starter. Others who are expected to pitch include Todd Collins, Chris Shark and B.J. Wojciechowski.
\ GRAYSON COUNTY: The Blue Devils lost seven starters off last year's state Group A semifinalists, but Coach Ed Goodson's lineup card is not without weapons.
Back to continue their reign of terror in the MED are catcher Mack Cassell and pitcher Devin Floyd.
Cassell ripped up the league last year with a .454 batting average, nine home runs and 45 RBI. At 6-foot-1, 200 pounds, Cassell has a powerful left-handed stroke (unusual for a catcher). The knock on him may be that he's a little tardy on throws to second, but who can quibble with those numbers?
"He's a [NCAA] Division I player and he may get drafted," Goodson said.
Floyd's future is bright indeed. As a freshman, the 6-4, 175-pound right-hander went 9-2 with a 1.54 ERA and fanned 95 in 59 innings.
Grayson County will also get a lot of help from immigrants from old Fries High, particularly designated hitter Jason Taylor (.450).
\ FORT CHISWELL: The Pioneers have a new coach in Mike Dixon, who is familiar to New River Valley sports fans as a former coach at Narrows and as the former general manager of the Pulaski Braves.
Dixon has a lot of pitching. The Pioneers will be going as much as - good grief! - 11-deep on the mound. The projected No. 1 is B.W. Hill, but he'll be pushed by veterans Tim Quesenberry, Jeff Freeman and Chad Underwood.
Third baseman/catcher Davis Goforth led Timesland hitters for most of last year and finished up in the .600 range. Plenty of returning players hit a ton, too.
When teams take on the Pioneers, they better be ready to play.
\ GALAX: Lot's of questions have to be answered here.
Be that as it may, Galax has a man with a plan in Larry Spangler, the dean of league coaches.
Two problems have emerged early: pitching and hitting. The mound staff is inexperienced and in the first two scrimmages of the year, the Maroon Tide had three hits.
The main candidates to shake the Tide out of the doldrums are first baseman Lynn Crockett (.370) and second baseman Clay Sawyers (.372).
\ BLAND: Prospects for the Rockets can be summarized in four words:
They're in deep trouble.
"We're going to be about as green as we can be," said coach Robin Thacker, seven years the head coach at Rural Retreat. "We've got 14 boys on the team and most of them have never played organized baseball before."
The best the Rockets can hope for is that their enemies will show a sporting amount of mercy.
by CNB