national championship.

Knowing Coach Lamb, it is the conviction here that we will be hearing a lot about Coach Lamb’s Yellow Jackets. See you when the dust has cleared in late November.

So you think it is hot at football and softball games?

The talk of football and softball fans everywhere is how hot it is watching the games. Yes, it is hot. In fact if you think it is hotter than it was in times past, you are absolutely right. There is an explanation for all this hot weather during the early part of modern football seasons.

Here it is early September and Georgia High Schools are about to play their fourth game of the season. Two were played in the month of August. Looking back over a few decades we find that no games were played in August. If this were the seasons of the late 1940s and early ‘50s the first game of the season would still be two weeks away. The outstanding season of 1948 featuring Kenneth Moore, Pete Lewis, “Crip” Stephens, Hubert Fowler, Otis Owens, Sam Edwards, Rex Meadows and many others did not begin their impressive run until September 17. Their season ended on a beautiful Thanksgiving afternoon in November.

The norm back in those days was for games to start in the middle of September. In what was my junior year, the Jackets opened against Trion on September 15 and the next year the first game wasn’t until September 21; still, I remember how hot it was even with later starting dates; how about all that in contrast to our early games of the modern day.

Gradually the opening day became earlier and earlier. Late August and early September got on the schedule beginning in 1958. It was 1962 when Calhoun played their first game in August.

The early beginnings are a necessity with the long playoff format. Then basketball is often late getting underway for many schools that play deep into the playoffs.

Lona Sims exciting beginning in varsity softball

Every athlete and their parents want their child to get off to a good start in their athletic career. Lona Sims has already had her beginning in softball as a player for Coach Lindsey on the Calhoun Middle School team. It is the big show when an athlete hits high school and takes to the field for the first time.

Lona Sims got to make her varsity debut for Coach Diane Smith when the Lady Jackets splayed Gordon Central last week. What would one want to do in their first at bat in a high school varsity game? Lona Sims hit a home run in her first game as a varsity player; she hit a homerun in that first at bat; more than that Lona hit the first pitch for that homerun in that first at bat. Three firsts it was: First game; first homerun and first pitch.

Lona’s granddad Dick Nesbitt has attended every game. Coach Diane Smith said she just happened to get a glimpse of the great expression on Dick’s face as the ball sailed out of the park.

A personal note: Dick Nesbitt and his identical twin brother Doug played on the first team of any kind I ever coached. It was back in the middle 1960s the twins joined Larry Roye, Jerry “Cotton” Moore, Jack Smith, Eddie Fox, Billy Taylor, Tony King, Larry Harmon and others to make up my Pirates Little League team.

Dick’s grandfather Bill Nesbitt and my Grandmother Foster were first cousins which certainly make me proud to claim kin with Lona; I connect up with my good friend “Moon” Holmes who is about the same relation with Lona on her mother’s side. As I write, “Moon” is taking care of a medical problem. He had to be admitted to the Gordon Hospital late last week due to a stroke. He is doing better now but having to watch his blood pressure.