Wait ‘til next year

By Jim Lisk, Editor

Sunday, July 13, 2008 July 14, 2008 08:43 am

— Post 76’s season is now over and after all is said and done, it was a pretty good season for a group of young players.
With a year more maturity and development, 2009 could be an exciting year for Stanly County.
One’s got to believe that Ethan Austin, Adrian Shepherd, Demetrius Ingram, Alex Robichaud, Corey Anderson and John McClure will all be better pitchers with another year of high school ball under their belt.
With college scouts taking a hard look at a number of these, there’ll be a real opportunity for those that will dedicate themselves to improving.
It’s been fun watching these young arms “toeing the rubber for Stanly County” as public address announcer David Talbert always says. Talbert does a great job with the PA and the nostalgic ride down memory lane with his in-between music.
While Talbert’s music soothes us ole gray heads, the current success of recent alumni from the Post 76 pitching staffs is certainly giving the current pitchers great incentive to dedicate themselves to their craft.
At the top of that alumni list is Brad Holt, who after four starts with the Brooklyn Cyclone is 1-2 with an excellent 2.81 ERA and 20 strike outs in 16 innings pitched.
Slowly his pitch count limit per start is increasing and his innings per start will be increasing as well. Expect his strike out per inning ratio to stay above 1.0 and his stay at this level to end before this summer’s over.
Russell Brewer continues to impress in the top college wooden bat league while last year’s Don Montgomery Award winner, B.J. Byerly is doing well as a starter in the Washington, D.C. area.
Every time Byerly comes to mind, the mammoth home run he hit at Lexington last year comes to mind. Sitting to the third base side and behind home plate on Monday night, I relived that blast. It was a rocket shot, climbing over the left-center field fence and just under the bottom row of lights some 30 feet above the fence.
I missed Corey Dick’s blast over the scoreboard in right-center at Holt Moffitt during the regular season, but Mike Duprez of the Lexington Dispatch called it one of the longest homers ever hit in the stadium.
That’s quite a feat for a 15-year-old third baseman, but certainly no fluke.
And Corey Dick is another one that’s going to be fun to watch as his career develops. He may be the man that proves that Stanly County can turn out more than just pitchers.

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