Who was your first-ever baseball coach and do you remember any of the players on the team?

Was thinking about this question today, while having lunch up at the Shane’s Rib Shack and the first baseball coach I had was Jerry Carrick and our team was the Guilford College Indians

Team members that I remember and we could probably go out and play one of those little League games tonight and we used to always play on Monday, Wednesday and Friday nights at the Guilford School Field and our team had:
Doug Martin at 3rd
Stan Stewart at SS and 3rd
Chuck Ralls at 2nd and at SS
Clay Hopcroft at 2nd
Eddie Yost in LF
Gary Cox in CF
David McDonald in RF
Mark Shaw at catcher
and Andy at 1st base….The pitchers were rotated between Doug Martin, Stan Stewart and Chuck Ralls…

There’s your team right there and it was a pretty good team back in the day going up against the Dodgers(Pete Eller coach), Tigers(Ed Royal/Ralph Stafford coaches), Yankees(Charlie King coach) and the Red Sox(Stumpy Brown coach)….

It was a five-team and you were lucky if you could finish second, because those Red Sox always had tons of players coming out of the same household and those kids were good….

Good days and a lot of good Summer baseball out of that part of town, back in that day…The only travel we did is when we came to town/Greensboro and played a team on occasion…..

15 thoughts on “Who was your first-ever baseball coach and do you remember any of the players on the team?

  1. Coach Gus Purcell with the Myers Park Youth Baseball Program in Charlotte, N.C.

  2. Smith Johnson was the coach, the team was the Northeast White Sox. 1973…still got the trophy! Great times….thanks Andy for bringing back the memory.

  3. Sure was a lot of fun to come into town(Greensboro) and play, especially at night…

    Fun to play teams like the Oddfellows Lodge, orange and black uniforms if memory is correct…

    Forbis and Dick
    Oddfellows Lodge
    Settoma Club
    CWA/Communications Workers of America and many more….

    About 15 years ago, Shamburgers was a power…

  4. I played a few pick-up games with some of those Hamilton Lakes guys and yes back in the day we did have pick-up baseball games and we had Bobby Hanna, George Hanna, Eddie Essa, Dale Meadows and some of the other guys from the Hamilton Lakes area in those games and we lined them up at a church, up on Friendly Avenue, and not the Friendly Avenue Baptist Church, the other one the fronts Friendly, near one of the entrances into the Hamilton Lakes neighborhood…

  5. My coach was Jimmy Oakley with Nuckles Restaurant.

    Our top rival was the Police Club.

    The baseball officials in Greensboro in those days were Bill Britt and Richard Thompson.

  6. I played for Jim Whitt in the Northeast Recreation program and he had a son named Billy Whitt that was the best young baseball player that I have ever seen. Don’t know what happened to those fellows but those were good days and it sounds to me like some of the best baseball was played back in those old days on the northeast side of Greensboro. Back in those days places like Summerfield, Colfax, Oak Ridge and Stokesdale, they din’t have much. We had their number back then, but today I guess it is a different story.

  7. Little League- Brightwood – Coach Phil Rudd
    Pony League – Pete Bush Insurance- Coach Pete Bush
    Colt League – Northeast – Coach Harvey Barham
    Palemnio League – Clyde’s Handi Mart – Cocah Tut ???
    NC Collegiate Summer League – Elon – Bobby Jones

  8. Talked to Tim Rich at Sprinkle #1 today and he said his first coach was James Sisk with the Northeast Cubs..Tim said Guy Patterson was on his team and that Guy had a good arm back then too…Tim also said that he was a pitcher and that Jay Bell hit a home run off of Tim one day when he pitched a two-hitter and that both of both of the hits that Tim gave up that day were HR’s and they were to the first two hitters in the game and after nada…Bell got one and never let Tim Rich forget it..

    Chris Rich at Sprinkle #2 said his first coach was Ed Cobbler at Brightwood and that Ed Cobbler was one very good coach…Ed had some good teams at Brightwood and in the Rec leagues over the years…..

  9. I think Ronnie Rudd was in some of the Northeast leagues over the years too and Ron Rudd was a good one(player) out there in the NEG district….

  10. A little off subject…I played for Coach Beasley(SEG) Roy Turner (SEG Colt, Greensboro Green Coach) Kevin Callahan (SEG) and finally the man, Alan Ash (APWU). Very blessed…Would like to hear others!

  11. SEG Alum you are trending right on the subject with the topic working toward hearing about all of the coaches we can collect…

    Keep those coaches coming from the beginning all the way down the road to your different levels of play…

    Good to hear about the very first man or woman and those that have along since then too….

  12. I did run into another local coach today, and that was Harry Clendenin and I saw him over at the Steak n Shake on Lawndale…Big baseball man….

    And early on the Northeast side of town has seemed to have the edge in what they have brought to the table from their early days of baseball in our area…

    Would like to hear more from the Southeast side and from the Northwest side too and what about the East side in general…Jetson Mills was a big name back then on the East side if memory serves me correctly and he just passed away some time last year or early this year…

  13. Coach Yates Khalif Temple Baseball
    We went 14-0 in regular season one year in bronco.The eastside boys
    Rodo
    Eric Mills, a man child at the time
    Chad ,the Light skinned lefty
    Scott,
    Lamont Mckinnon side arm picther,,
    the whaler
    Philip
    Little Freddy
    Palmer(JR TRoutman)
    Magoo
    Reggie Robinson
    a couple of others I cant remember there names, We played against some great players at the time,,

    Like Curtis Dickens , POlice club, he used to throw the Heat
    Greg Franklin, Corey Walker , Bam at Police Dept
    Alex Little, Gordan Sellers , Gillispie Park
    Tom Taylor, HOme Federal
    Thomas Roberts and Toby Greenfield
    Albright,, and William Turner, the reds i believe.
    Suttons Cone Mill braves,
    I remember a tough team called the Nuckles
    Hey chime in

    ,

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