To the Editor,
American Legion baseball (local, state, and national) was cancelled this year due to COVID-19. However, Area 3 of our state formed an independent league called NC3 American League Baseball for one year to replace legion ball for the benefit of area players and fans. It’s a great opportunity for players to represent their communities, gain valuable experience, improve their skills, and play with some of the best high school players in their area and against some of the best players in a multi-county region.
The legion schedule is fast paced with 25-30 games or more in a seven-week regular season (playing 3 to 5 games weekly). Many dedicated players are needed, probably 20 or more with many pitchers, because of the fast pace, the Area 3 playoffs, the possibility of making state playoffs, Mid-Atlantic regionals, or even the World Series on ESPN.
Typically, the better senior teams have mostly 18- and 19-year-olds, junior teams have 15- to 17-year-olds, and teams are unlikely to have a winning season with a small squad of 10-15 players or with mostly younger players.
After several years without a legion team representing Surry or Stokes in legion baseball, Stokes County Post 290 started a junior team in 2017. They continued with junior teams in 2018 and 2019 and added a senior team in 2019, and expected to have both teams again in 2020. Mount Airy started a junior team in 2019 and too quickly, in my opinion, decided to try for both a junior and senior team in 2020. This resulted in younger programs for both teams and both are finding tough competition this summer, with the senior team struggling to have enough players at some games.
This year Stokes County had ten senior legion players who had either played a shortened season of college baseball or were starting their college careers this fall, plus three to four rising high school seniors. With a potentially good core roster, they didn’t find a few more pitchers and position players to fill out their roster and regrettably cancelled a promising season.
Mount Airy senior legion draws players from all Surry high schools except East Surry and Stokes senior legion is comprised of players from East Surry, all three Stokes high schools and some of northern Forsyth. I suggest that our communities need one stronger senior legion team in order to compete with the larger areas such as Rowan, Randolph, High Point, Greensboro, Lexington/Davidson, Mocksville, among others.
Why can’t Mount Airy Post 123 and Stokes County Post 290 combine and our communities work together to sustain one stronger senior legion team rather than, as this year, have one team struggle to have enough players at their games and the other team cancel their season before it gets started?
Our communities need at least three junior teams: at least one each from Surry, Stokes, and northern Forsyth. Then, at least three junior teams to draw from in future years would maintain a stronger senior team. Improved cooperation and support is needed from all area high school baseball programs for legion baseball to be successful. High school programs will benefit from improved player skills, added experience, and sportsmanship through their players exposure to legion baseball.
Maybe we could learn how to be more successful in legion baseball if we found out how the premier teams from our Area 3 remain successful year after year. How do they attract the best high school players and graduates, and college players? How do the better teams select coaches, get support from their high school programs, attain business and financial support, get media exposure from their area newspapers, have radio stations transmit their games, have such great community involvement, and fan support? We need our communities working together, and in time our tri-county area can be one of the premier legion baseball programs. Let’s not let senior American Legion baseball in our area die.
Wick Bullington
Pinnacle
Source: https://www.mtairynews.com
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