Easter Baseball Tournament ends in a Wild Hare

This might have been the most bizarre ending in Greensboro Sports history. The knuckleheads that are doing this stupid 200 Year Greensboro Celebration should have been out at the Grimlsey High School baseball field and they would have seen some history taking place.

This is where it all went down…..Alan Ashkinazy and his troops put together an Easter Tournament and let me tell you as far as the radio broadcast part goes we could not have had any closer games. It was 15-13 on Saturday, Grimsley over Burlington Williams. Monday, Grimsley topped Thomasville 10-9, then our game on Tuesday had the Dudley Panthers knocking off the RL Patton Panthers 6-5 in eight innings. A two-run game, a one-run game, and an extra inning game that Dudley pulls out in the bottom of the 8th after being down 5-4 and then the Dudley Panthers come roaring back to take the title 6-5.

That’s what I am talking about. How many of you heard the games? Send me an E-mail at durhamandy@live.com.

The Dudley Panthers are known for their State Championship basketball and football teams. Now, Dudley can be known for it’s Championship baseball team. Ray Crawford(3B) was named tournament MVP. Ronnie Burkes(C) won the Best Defensive Player award. Reuben Torellas(P/OF) was named to the All-Tournament team. Tevn Neal was the winning pitcher in Tuesday’s finale. The list of Panther stars goes on and on. AJ Williams had two key hits in the championship game and drove in two runs.

Dudley fought and battled back all evening long. Dudley was down early 1-0 and then they garbbed a 3-1 lead over the Patton Panthers. Patton tied the game at 3-3 and then the visitors went up 4-3 before our Dudley boys knotted the score at 4-4 in the bottom of the 7th to send the game into extra innings. Patton jumped back out in front with one run in the top of the eighth to re-gain the lead 5-4 and to set the stage for the WILDEST baseball and maybe what might just be remembered as the WILDEST FINISH in Greensboro Sports history.

In the bottom of the 8th the Wild Hare, that makes these ball games so crazy, came running on to the field. Dudley was down by one run and there was at least one out and Dudley was able to get two runners on base and then comes the Wild Hare. The Dudley batter sends one into the outfield for a hit and the Dudley runners are moving on que. The runner at third comes in to score and we are tied at 5-5 but the runner from second rounds third and makes a sharpe turn and falls down but he gets back and heads toward home but the home plate umpire throws up his hands like he is calling time but he is not calling time….The fans figure the game has been stopped and that time has been called and that the Dudley runner will have to go back to third and we will still be tied at 5-5…Time was stopped because the throw that came in from the outfield on the Dudley hit that drove in the tying run, well, that thrown ball had got caught in the fence near the Dudley dugout on the third base side and when the RL Patton catcher, Chris Fine, went to pick up the ball and pulled it out from underneath the fence then the Dudley runner who had made the wild turn at third, well he was awarded HOME and that becomes run number 6 and Dudley wins it 6-5 over RL Patton.

The ball got stuck in the fence on the throw in to third/home from the outfield and when the Patton catcher pulled it loose from underneath the fence the home plate umpire awarded the Dudley runner at third, home, even though most of the fans thought time had been called. The rules are the rules and just like when the ball gets stuck in the outfield ivey/bushes then the runner is awarded the next base and the runner at third had made his turn and was headed home before he made his move back to the third base bag.

WILD, WILD, WILD, WILD…….It was like a Wild Hare had run on to the field at the Rice Toyota/Grimsley Easter Baseball Tournament. The Dudley Panthers(8-3) are your CHAMPIONS with the 6-5 victory over RL Patton out of Morganton(9-3). Dudley kept fighting and clawing their way back into this thing and earned the title and they did it hard way and WILD WAY…This Dudley baseball program under the leadership of Larry Farrar and JB Baynes has really come a LONG way. The coaches, kids, and parents deserve a lot of credit. I see Mr. Crawford, Mr. Neal, and many other parents and Panther supporters at every game.

We also need to give credit to the RL Patton Panthers, a 2-A school and pretty much a brand new school in Morganton. Their team is loaded with a bunch of sophomores on the squad and they are good and they are only going to get better. Patton had great fan support and a strong following throughout the tournament.

While handing out credits we have to mention Alan Ashkinazy who came up with the idea for this tournament and put it all together and ran it non-stop for the three-day period. Joe Wren and his wife Paula were there to be Alan’s right and left hand assistants and Debbie Nettesheim was up in the booth working the scoreboard and Kevin Rose’s dad was keeping the scorebook for every game. There were also some tire-less workers down in the concession stand. Tony Sutphin was there to help Alan with the baseball chores and to help with the Post-Tournament Awards Ceremony.

Back to the baseball, Grimsley(7-4) defeated Trinity in the third place game on Tuesday afternoon 6-2. Alan Ashkinazy said the real hard part of the Easter Baseball run was trying to coach his team and run the tournament at the same time. George Carter was the winning Whirlie pitcher and Jon Wilkinson came on in relief. Gabe Dimock went 4-4 with a double, an RBI, he scored a run, and he got popped on the catcher’s mask by a hard foul ball. Matt Nettesheim was 2-3 and he also had a double, an RBI, and he scored a run for the Whirlies. In other games at Grimsley, North Stanley bested High Point Central 12-4 and Burlington Williams topped Reidsville 8-4.

In other area games on Tuesday, Ragsdale rolled over Southern Guilford 13-7 and Northeast Guilford shut out Eastern 6-0. Ragsdale and NEG are set to meet in the finals of this four-team Easter get together this afternoon at NEG. SG will face EG in the consolation game. Both games will be re-matches of last year’s finals held at Ragsdale. In the win over SG the Ragsdale Tigers were led by Nate Cash with 4RBI’S and DeSean Anderson with 3RBI’s. Alex Walters had home run and a triple for the Tigers. Kyle Brandenburg was a perfect 4-4 and Billy Stone earned the win for the Tigers(10-1/5-0). Don’t forget the game next Tuesday with Southeast hosting Ragsdale and remember both clubs are (5-0) in the conference…Huge showdown at SEG…..

In the Tuesday win for NEG, the Rams(7-4) were led by Evan Underhill and Garrett Lewis and will NEG send Taylor Atkins to the mound tonight to as they try and take out Ragsdale for the title at NEG? Northwest Guilford(5-3) eased past Havelock 5-3 in the Crystal Coast Easter Classic being held down east and Logan Self did most of it himself on Tuesday for the Vikings leading them to the two-run victory. Chris Glover was 4-6 with 2HR’s and 6RBI’s to help give the Smith Golden Eagles an 18-9 win over WS Atkins.

We will have more updates and news on Wednesday and if you reading or hearing about these ball games give us a yell at durhamandy@live.com……

5 thoughts on “Easter Baseball Tournament ends in a Wild Hare

  1. That Ragsdale-SE Guilford game will be a great one. Not only are both teams 5-0 in conference but Ragsdale is the new #1 3A team in the Impact Baseball Poll and SE Guilford is #4. Hopefully this will be the first of three (or more) games between two top flight teams.

  2. I just saw that new poll today over at thisboardrocks.com and Ragsdale at (10-1/5-0) has grabbed the #1 spot and the pre-season #1 Rocky Mount, I believe it was, has fallen way down in the Top Ten. Southeast(8-2/5-0) started out ranked higher than Ragsdale but the Falcons have fallen down to the #4/#5 range and Southwest has dropped out of the poll altogether….

    Next Tuesday at SEG, and no fooling, this will be the Big One……

  3. Northwest Guilford(5-3) eased past Havelock 5-3 in the Crystal Coast Easter Classic being held down east and Logan Self did most of it himself on Tuesday for the Vikings leading them to the two-run victory.

    I am not real sure why a statement like this was made. What stats do you have to justify this? Did he have all the hits that led to runs? Even if he did have 5 rbis’s, if they weren’t HR’s…someone else had to have done something. Did he strike out all the batters he faced? If not, someone else did something to help. I think what I saw was that he had 3 strikeouts out of 16 outs. Someone else helped out defensively. I am not questioning that Logan is a good player, only that he is surrounded by some great teammates that also had a part in the win, but for some reason they have been ignored.

    Although we have many great players in this area, comments that attribute a win mainly to one player does nothing but diminish what baseball is… a team sport!

  4. Very limited info on Northwest from the 5-3 win over Havelock and that’s why it was phrased that Logan Self must have done most it by himself. I make the most of what I can dig up with much of the info coming from the News and Record and if I don’t have names then I try to at least make the write-up sound half-way creative and interesting.

    If I am at a game in person then I have a more of an opportunity to lay out the increase of names and numbers which is why I had a good amount of details on the Dudley-Patton game since I was at that one doing the radio broadcast.

    Keep us on our toes, sometimes we need these good wake up calls. Thanks…..

  5. Thanks for taking my comment so well. It was intended to be helpful and I am glad that you took it in that spirit. I for one…and it’s just me,would prefer nothing rather than a ‘regurgitation’ of the News and Record. I think most people visit sites such as this one because they are not getting the desired information from their newspapers.

    By the way…if ‘creative and interesting’ is your desire, maybe you should start a political forum. Facts aren’t usually important in that realm as long as it sounds good! LOL!

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