Friday Features: ‘Snow’ start sidelines CBU baseball early
By Maurice Patton
Christian Brothers grabbed a one-run win in its March 15 baseball season opener at GSC rival North Alabama.
OK, so it wasn’t really the season opener for the Bucs – but it sure felt like it, as the team endured an opening portion of the schedule that was marked by 10 postponements or cancellations, with five of those coming during a recent two-week stretch of inactivity.
“When we got on the bus, before we left for the Sunday game, I said ‘pitchers, these are the position players; position players, these are the pitchers’,” veteran CBU coach Phil Goodwin recalled. “Until this past weekend, the last time we’d played was Feb. 28.”
And when they did make it on the field, the Bucs saw their struggles as they dropped seven of their initial 13 games.
So a restart wasn’t necessarily the worst thing that could happen for Goodwin and his team.
“The kids were anxious to get on the field,” he said, as CBU gets set for a conference series with visiting Valdosta State this weekend. “We didn’t know it was going to be North Alabama the first time, but we came out and had some success.”
Following the 3-2 win, Christian Brothers dropped both ends of a doubleheader at UNA but bounced back Wednesday to defeat LeMoyne-Owen 10-0 – bringing the team’s record to 8-9 overall, 3-6 in GSC play.
By far, though, the Bucs’ toughest opponent has been the weather. Included in the cancellations were conference three-game sets against Shorter and Delta State that, by rule, will not be rescheduled.
“We had a combination of heavy rain, we had a day when we had five or six inches of snow and ice and we had to take several days for that to melt,” Goodwin said. “We tried to play one midweek game and used 40 bags of infield dry – about 2,000 pounds – and we couldn’t get it to dry. We couldn’t get it playable.
“We have an old warehouse building we’ve turned into an indoor facility. All we were able to do was throw bullpens and hit inside. We had one day we were able to get outside and practice in the outfield. It was a tough time.”
Goodwin, who coached in the Memphis high school ranks and spent time on the staff of the Memphis Chicks – the Class AA affiliate of the Kansas City Royals – was tempted to revert to his prep days to remedy his weather woes.
“I burned a field one time,” he recalled. “We poured some diesel on a couple of puddles and lit it. All of a sudden, there were a lot of people there. It drew a little attention.
“The wind shifted on me and I burned all the hair off the back of one of my legs. That was the last time I did that.”
Goodwin’s hopes are that his team heats up now that the weather is showing signs of doing so.
“Once you get into the season, you’re ready to play baseball,” he said. “You’re tired of seeing each other and ready to see somebody in the other dugout. This has been like another preseason. Everybody’s tired of being inside. You just want to play.”
Follow Patton on Twitter at:
@mopatton_sports. E-mail comments to:
mopattonsports@gmail.com.
Join in on the conversation using #FridayFeatures on
Twitter and
Facebook.
Past Friday Features
11/07/2014 - NCAA Leader Chloe Richards Finds a Home at UNA.
11/14/2014 - Revival of a Rivalry.
11/21/2014 - VSU's Margaret Stauffer Finds Strength in Team, Family.
11/28/2014 - Union Off and Running.
12/05/2014 - UWA Coach Ray Stanfield Pushes Cross Country Teams to Top.
12/12/2014 - CBU Men's Basketball Making Noise.
12/19/2014 - Dickey Says UWG Football 'Right on Schedule'.
12/26/2014 - Youngsters Lead UWF Women.
1/02/2015 - UAH's Owens Rebounds From Car Crash With New Appreciation for Life, Basketball.
1/09/2015 - Freshmen Building Base for Lee Women's Success.
1/16/2015 - UWA's Chad Toocheck Overcame Addiction Lows to Reach Highs on Field.
1/23/2015 - Basketball Court at Delta State Named For a 'Legend'.
1/30/2015 - Shorter Basketball Coaches Celebrate Milestones Victories.
2/06/2015 - Union Outfielder Unfazed by Physical Challenges.
2/13/2015 - VSU's Courtney Albritton Rewriting Record Books.
2/20/2015 - Campbell Leaves 'Mark' as Union Women's Hoops Coach.
2/27/2015 - UNA's Spehr Leads From 'Down Under'.
3/06/2015 - Title Hopes For DSU Boosted By Triple Threat.
3/13/2015 - UAH Coach Les Stuedeman Lifts Chargers to Softball Greatness.