Covington baseball off to good start
Like strays sometimes do, Scrappy just appeared out of nowhere and quickly became part of the family.
"We found him in the locker room one day," said Covington junior baseball standout Brock Lomax.
His batterymate, senior catcher Cole Howard added, "I think one of my buddies won it out of a vending machine at Ming's Buffet and brought it up there. He's been our good luck charm ever since."
Scrappy is a chain-wearing stuffed bulldog that perches in the Chargers dugout on game-day. As far as gimmicks go, it's pretty good one. And Scrappy is definitely doing his job.
The Chargers — one of the top teams participating in this week's 25th USA Classic — entered the event second behind Collierville in The Commercial Appeal's weekly rankings and second behind Gibbs in the Tennessee Baseball Coaches Association state poll.
They opened tournament play Wednesday with an 8-1 victory over Christian County (Ky.) thanks in large part to a dominating effort from starting pitcher Christian Delashmit that ran their record to 14-4. The Classic final will be played Saturday at 4:30 p.m. at USA Stadium and it would not be a surprise to see the Chargers in it.
Nor would it be a surprise to see them at Spring Fling; coach David Sage has an arsenal of arms he can throw out there and a solid batting order that produced double-digit runs in nine games.
In short, there's plenty of bite to go with Covington's bark. And that's the way Sage wants it.
"We've got a good mixture of kids that have played a lot of baseball," he said. "We start 2-3 seniors depending on who's pitching and the rest are juniors ... they just play hard all the time but they're a nonchalant bunch. I'm an old school coach; I get on them and sometimes they respond and sometimes they don't.
"I've told our team ... I don't want us to be a bunch of (jerks). I don't want to be that team that everybody hates but I want to be that team that everybody fears. And the way to do that is by winning."
Adds Lomax, a junior who doubles as the school's star quarterback, "It's all fun and games talking smack (but) when it comes down to it, you've got to handle business."
That's precisely what Covington's done, despite a rigorous schedule. The losses have come against Collierville, nationally-ranked Har-Ber out of Springdale, Ark. and two schools that threw future Division I pitchers at them, Doral Academy (Fla.) and Barrington (Ill.).
The loss to Doral came in last month's prestigious IMG National Classic, an event featuring a strong national field and one that Covington ended with a 3-1 record after downing another nationally-ranked squad — Bergen Catholic from New Jersey — in the consolation final.
It's a performance that Covington can build on as it chases its first state championship since 2006.
"Doral Academy, we lost in 10 innings," said Sage. "They had four D-1 players and (junior) Ty (Warmath) pitched a 1-1 game through eight with 11 strikeouts. We didn't win it but ... we were down in Florida, at the beach, playing ball and lost the first game but came back and won the next three."
Reach John Varlas at john.varlas@commercialappeal.com or on Twitter @johnvarlas