The mid-April Missouri High School Baseball Coaches Association rankings were released today (4/19) and Greenville Bears moved up two spots to the #2 rank in Class 2 baseball.
Many will claim “rankings don’t mean anything” but those that do are usually not on the list. Rankings do mean something; with rankings come school pride, team excitement, bragging rights and a target on the back of your jersey. Everyone knows that state ranking gives your opponents even more reason to bring their “A Game.”
In the history of Greenville school district, no team has ever been honored to this degree. Until this group of Greenville players & coaches took the field, Greenville had never dreamed of being ranked. Toward the end of the 2014 season, Greenville appeared in the #10 spot. But before the first game of 2015 was played, the State Coaches Association pushed Greenville up to the #4 spot and then this week the Bears rose two more slots to #2.
Greenville ends the third week of April at 11-0 outscoring their opponents 98-9, keeping their opponents to less than 1 run per game (actually .81 runs).
So far this season, the team’s batting average is .345 and an incredible 1.006 OPS (on-base percentage plus slugging percentage ). Eliminate the wood bat games from the Bears’ schedule and the team’s batting average jumps almost 50 points to .392 (wood bat games typically have less offense) .
Perched at the top of Class 2 is last year’s state champions Valle Catholic (a private school near Ste Genevieve). The two teams are not scheduled to meet during the season. But, if both teams are able to prevail in their own district tournament at the end of the season, they will face each other the following week in Sectionals.
Kudos to the Greenville Bears:
Seniors: Lathan Blackburn, Devon Duncan, Jacob Withrow
Juniors: Ben Becker, Justin Darnell, Jake Dorris, Cody Jackson, Blakeney Kearbey, Grant Miller, Trynt Tompkins
Sophomores: Wyatt Barks, Trey McDaniel, Will VanMatre
Freshmen: Mason McFadden, Noah Suratt, Garrett Rikard
Coaches: Jeff Null, Scott Blackburn
Class 2
- Valle Catholic
- Greenville
- Linn
- East Carter
- Sturgeon
- Plato
- Cooter
- Bernie
- Scotland County
- Crane