State Predictions

I'll go with James River, South County, Great Bridge and Battlefield.

I don't see anyone getting by Kenny Towns.

quote:

Originally posted by Midlo Dad:
I'll go with James River, South County, Great Bridge and Battlefield.

I don't see anyone getting by Kenny Towns.

Your prediction is confusing. Kenny Towns plays for Lake Braddock which will face Great Bridge at ODU.

all year looks like south county has been a heavy favorite...someone said thjey havent lost in 29 games? dont see how that can be?

Coach at JR has won this tournament twice in last 4 or 5 years. That has to help that team. Tney have three great pitchers and plenty of bats..seem to make a couple of costly errors a game that makes me question their defense.
Godwin has two very good pitchers in Lees and Garrett...strong hitters and solid defense.

Any team at the beach will be tough...lots of talent down that way but seems like it is spread out among all tnhe teams. Gatorade POY plays for Great Bridge.

quote:

Gatorade POY plays for Great Bridge

That will be a big surprise to the Western Branch team.

South County beat LB twice when Towns pitched. He is one of the best pitchers and can shut down anyone on any given day.

I believe the winner of the semi-final in South County's side of the bracket will win. James River has the pitching and bats to keep a game close, not to mention a couple come-from-behind victories in the regional. it is hard to go against South County however as they have been hot all year. However, is anyone else getting some deja vu from last year's tournament?

I will take:

James River
South County
Lake Braddock
Godwin

quote:

South County beat LB twice when Towns pitched. He is one of the best pitchers and can shut down anyone on any given day.

Towns' one loss on the season came against south county. LB was leading 3-1 going into the bottom of the sixth.

quote:

Originally posted by hsbasballfan:
...Gatorade POY plays for Great Bridge.

No, he does not.

quote:

Your prediction is confusing.

Not confusING. Just confusED.

I got mixed up on which team was his!

That's what I get for working from memory with things I have only passing observation of.

Guessing is just a **** shoot anyway, just for grins.

But I guess I'll switch now and take Lake Braddock over Great Bridge!

quote:

Originally posted by redbird5:

quote:

Originally posted by hsbasballfan:
...Gatorade POY plays for Great Bridge.

No, he does not.

Redbird5's right. Nick Thompson plays for Western Branch High School, who lost to Nansemond River in the Southeastern District semifinals.

See, this whole confusion thing is catching!

South County is, i believe, 26-0 to this point in the season. Their story is really being underplayed up here in NoVA. They have two very good D1-bound pitchers in Frazier and Beal, and as a team, they have hit fifty, that's 50, home runs in those 26 wins. A number of wins came by blowout, and a number of wins have come in their last at-bat. They can win a 15-14 game just as easily as a 3-2 game. They have beaten up some very good pitchers in the region, righties, lefties, hard throwers, as well as finesse guys. There are no easy outs in their lineup. 1-9 can all take the ball out of the ballpark. There is no blueprint on how to beat this team, or if there is, no team has produced one yet.

I don't see any deja-vu happening this year as a previous poster mentioned, referring to Woodbridge rolling into the state final at 27-0, only to finish at 27-1. Woodbridge had not seen a pitcher the likes of Wahl at any point in those 27 wins. I don't think South County will be surprised or overmatched by any pitcher remaining in this tournament. To me, South County is the heavy favorite to win the title. Their opponent would need to play a flawless game, and so many things would need to break down for SoCo to lose, that the odds are very small.

That said, should Lake Braddock get there, I would give them more than a puncher's chance. Having already seen SoCo four times this season, coach Rutherford may yet put that blueprint together.

Ditto on what Rollapair says.

This is South County's year. To come out of the Patriot District undefeated, is an amazing feat.

I agree. There are no weak spots in the lineup and the pitching has been excellent. I am just hoping they get a chance to beat us five times this year. That might be some kind of record...

if they are a home run hitting team they will have an advantage onthat little westfield field should they get that far. did you guys just leave the engraving shop and make sure their name is spelled correctly on the trophy?

HSbasball, nobody on this thread is foolish enough to be engraving any names onto trophies yet. That said, Rollapair is right on with his analysis of South County. I'll stick with the prediction I made 3 months ago that SoCo is the odds-on favorite to win the States.

Great Bridge is a very good team with a great history, but I wouldn't be shocked to see Lake Braddock upsetting them on Tuesday. If that happens, I predict that there will be a LB/SoCo State final game, which would be "off the charts" in excitement.

I expect that the other two games in the first round will go to the home teams.

No matter what, the next week will hold some fantastic matchups.

what kimd of pitching does James River amd Godwin have?

Well one thing is for sure - whichever tams make it to Friday are all capable of taking the title.

I can only speak about the Central region teams. JRHS has UVA bound Kirby and a future AFLAC kid in Roberts who was still 93 in the 5th vs Deep Run. To top that all off they are likely the 2nd and 3rd most effective pitchers on the staff behind All-Region Kit Scheetz. So JRHS has some arms for SC to contend with that are (I am asuming) as good as any they have see this year.

Godwin has VCU bound Lees and VMI bound Garrett as well as a third quality arm in Stevens so they are pretty solid as well. Where Godwin might be thin is in their offense. They are senior heavy so are likely to be solid and not give anything away but they will need to produce some timely hits if they want to get past Battlefield.

This time of the year typically comes down to who limits their mistakes and pitches well. Most teams have one shutdown arm who makes runs hard to come by. For these reasons I am liking the chances of both central teams because they have high end arms but also are at least 3 deep with D1 quality.

But this is why they play the games I guess.

ever notice when a team is really good people afiliated with teams they beat want to believe no one else can beat them?
If Lees , Garrett, Kirby , Roberts pitch well they will be tough in this tournament.....was just thinking how many State Baseball Champiomships James River and Godwin have between them...5 or 6
? Godwins were several year ago but they have a verty good program...JR won State tittles recently

HS, are you making an obtuse reference to anyone in particular, or are you just asking random questions? It's hard to respond to the question if you aren't more specific.

I'm a big James River fan and I would love to see them win it all. But I have my doubts as to whether they'll get there. There are things they do that they get away with some times, but that tend to cost you in tense, close games. They lost their first two games with Cosby that way. (They lost to Cosby all three times, but the third time was not close at all.)

I think they can win tomorrow but after that, I don't think they would be the favorite in the final four.

That being said, it's single elimination and things happen. There's a reason why the World Series is best of 7 -- and it's not just to sell tickets and rake in the TV money, though obviously that's a big part of it! It's because anyone who's ever been around baseball knows that even if you pull out all the stops and do everything flawlessly, the most you can do is improve the odds of your winning. This ain't football and you can't just steamroll a team that you might think is not your equal.

If you really knew all the teams in the tourney and you knew they would all play best of 3 or something, you could predict outcomes with at least some hope for accuracy. Predicting in single elimination, you may as well go buy lottery tickets.

In just the past few years we've seen teams derailed by a bad call here, a bad break with the weather there, a close play at the plate or a base running mistake that cost a run in a game that ended up in extra innings, etc.

All I know for sure about James River is, they won't run out of pitching. But they are not the only team in the draw who can say that.

Last time JR won it, they had to fend off a strong semifinal challenge with a 2-hitter and a walk-off HR in the 8th. They were very fortunate to survive that game.

I know nothing about South County but you cannot ignore someone who's 26-0. Surely they are the favorites. But as was previously noted, we had an undefeated team go down in last year's tourney as well. Being the favorite won't matter if someone comes with their A game and you maybe walk a guy and make an error that opens up even just one inning.

Midlo - Amen to your call on a single game. A couple of other things that can happen:

A at'em line drive with the bases loaded.
A couple of Ground ball DP's
A pitcher you've never seen throwing off hitters timing for 5 innings.
The game of a lifetime by anyone.

I'm in the same boat as Swampboy, but I'll point out that Woodson's pitching this year was probably as deep as any team's with 4 D1 signees they could send to the mound...if memory servers correctly, they were beaten by South County and Lake Braddock along with a few other teams...So were some other very talented pitchers...

I'm going to go with James River, South County, Lake Braddock and Battlefield for Tuesday...

Getting back to pitchers, of the games I saw this season, the best performance by far was by Vanderplas who really kept the hitters off balance...Unfortunately none of the remaining teams will get to see him...

Swampboy....not trying to talk trash..dont even have a dog in this fight. I was pointing out two teams who come from a culture of winning at the state level will be in the tournament...JRs coach has two state championship rings which i think is significant.
Felt like the South County and Patriot District's strength was overstated by folks who may not have seen anyone play,pitch,or hit outside of that area.
I agree with Midlo that there may be some things other than pitching and hitting that cost JR..they are young and lack what I think is one key element to ultimate success.
I can promise you Godwin had a kid pitch a game last week that if you saw it you would be hesitant to declare "SoCo" has already beaten the best pitchers in the state-same true with the UVA lefty JR has.
A great triva question may be who was the last team to win a State Baseball Championship with a perfect record? Has it ever been done? Woodbridge came close last year until they ran into an awful good pitcher

I believe the answer to your trivia question would be James Madison HS, 2002.

Midlo's post is on the mark -- in a single elimination format, anything can happen. Although the most talented team will usually win, that isn't always going to be the case...and any coach that has won a State title will tell you that there was a little luck along the way -- a call that went your way, a line drive hit right to your SS, an error or two by the other team, whatever...

Now you can make the point that good teams make their own luck, which is true, but that's only part of the equation.

I would love to see the tournament format go to a double elimination, because I think that has a much better chance of rewarding the best team with a championship, however that's not really feasible with the end of school approaching and the travel that would be necessary to have that many games.

hsbaseballfan--
Fair enough. Sorry for the quick reaction.

Berry - A double elimination could work if the State Tournament consisted of only the Regional Winners. It would be a 4 team tournament and look like the NCAA Regionals. The tournament could be done in 3 days if teams played more than one game per day. Weather could be a big problem too.

Biggest drawback is that it would tax the pitching of most HS teams. Too many coaches that close to a State title would probably have star pitchers throwing 200+ pitches over the 3 days.

And then there's all that pesky academic stuff, like exams, graduation, etc. If only we could get that out of the way, we could just play all day every day!

some states play a best of 3 game series for the state title (NC). baseball it seems to me lends itself to being a best 2 out of 3 sport IMHO.

just a brief aside, since the state semis and final are less than 24 hours apart, I wonder if there would ever be a scenario where the state championship 4 hoops would be scheduled that close together?

not likely.

Who was the 1st AAA undefeated state champion?

There have only been a handful of undefeated AAA champs, but the 1975 Kempsville team is the first I'm aware of under our current system to have done it.

not alot of baseball info but here is a link to the VHSL record book...even though baseball is kown as a numbers game football and other sports have done a better job of keepig stats in the book...

http://www.vhsl.org/files/pub-...recordbook-jun09.pdf

Great Bridge has been there before and won.Certainly not as many times as James River,but I can assure you Wiley is a true baseball coach with a quality resume in baseball,Old Dominion player back in the Newman era,Team USA,California Angels and other complimentary awards/accomplishments.Putting the kids to the side for a moment,how about the coaches experience from the other teams in the tournament.Sounds like James River has been there before,but how do these guys stack-up in game time talent.Certainly,in close games it usually comes down to coaching decisions.

I can only think of four teams offhand that have done it. I may be missing one or two. 1975 Kempsville, 1987 Mills Godwin, 1993 First Colonial, and 2002 Madison. None have done it since.

One of the things that makes baseball so unique is that there isn't as much of a correlation between record and historical greatness. That is, of course it's an impressive accomplishment, and it's obviously more likely that a team that goes 26-0 is better than a team at the same level that goes 18-8. However, as Midlo Dad mentioned earlier, this isn't football.

In thinking about the greatest teams in Virginia history, I would put that 2007 James River team high on the list, and even they lost twice. I attended the state tournament in 2002 when Madison won, and they were very good, but I thought for sure at the time that the Kellam team that lost in the semi-finals to Tucker was the most talented team in the bracket (Ryan Zimmerman was the SS on that team).

probably the most talent rich team that didnt win was the Cosby team of 2008.
Loaded with D1 talent..Bowers(WM), Shaban(VT), Shaban(JMU), Parker(Seton Hall), Lowery (JMU), Sollars (longwood)

All due respect, the best team not to win was the Tucker team in 1984. Probably the best team I've ever seen, period. They got upset in the finals by Halifax. First six guys in the batting order were all D-I (and that's not even counting pitcher-only / bench guys). Several guys went on to play pro ball, and that doesn't count third baseman Tim Legler, who decided to concentrate on basketball after getting drafted by the Pirates out of high school. That obviously worked out for the best.

That's why they play. ANY TEAM can beat ANY TEAM one time.

Sometimes I think the "long shot" teams have less to lose and tend to play a lot looser because of it.

Right on. As Midlo Dad said, a single-elimination tournament in baseball is unpredictable. That's part of the fun - and part of the frustration for very talented teams that get caught by hot bats or an off-night.