#1 Butler Vs #2 South Caldwell

I know it's early, but this one's for all the marbles...

 

I am going to get on my soapbox for a sec...

WHY is this game not a regional final? There are 3 perfectly good polls in North Carolina. SEED THE TOURNAMENT!!!

I laughed at how Watauga got the easiest first round draw out of the NW4A teams and they were the 4 seed. AC Reynolds deserved a easier first round game than Weddington too, by the way. Its not hard to look at team records and who beat who and seed a tournament. I promise. If you are going to pitch a fit about travel, win more games.

And another thing... 64 teams per classification made the field this year... THATS A JOKE TOO! Remember when it used to mean something just to be in the tournament and FIVE wins didn't get you in the dance.

It is a crying shame that two teams that combined have THREE loses between them are meeting now insted of in a best of three series. Its a travesty that one error or one strikeout with runners in scoring postion or one walk is going to end a good team's season in the blink of an eye.

....so all I got to say is... GO SPARTANS!

 

I'm a SW4A guy, but, with Lefty pitching you gotta favor SC. Good luck to both teams. This should be a fun game to watch.

 

Admittedly the seeding could be done differently but when your in a conference that is as strong as the sw or nw it certainly makes it hard to be fair. If you said the top 2 teams in each conf make it what about a week conf like queen city vs a conf like sw or nw? How on earth do you make it fair? If you go outside the conf for records for seeding you will have coaches scheduling weak games just to make the show. If they wait and do it at the last second they will be acused of being unfair. No system is perfect. Personally after the third round I would like to see a best of three or at least a double elim but I'm not sure time allows that

By the way I'm pulling for the spartans

 

I agree with you DS, but one of the reasons this game is going to be even more exciting is it is one and done. The pressure and hype on this one game will far exceed the environment one faces at the State Championship.

This will be the most hyped, the biggest crowd in Butler's history. There will be people forced to sit in the stands at the football game to watch this one.

I'm going to tell you now. Butler cannot hold all of the people coming to this game. It will be nuts, crazy, insane. Just think about this. The Whole Caldwell County will be there. People from all of the SW4A schools will be represented....All of Butler and it's Bulldog will be there. The Butler folks aren't leaving tonights game. They are staking out their seats now.

 

See.........

other thread! Yes, Butler has some pretty fine tradition, but there have always been questions at least from my experience. I am rooting for them believe it or not..yet...good things happen to GOOOOOOOOOOOOD people. And I know something I 'd rather lay to rest. Met and coached with a couple of guys from Butler few years back. I liked them and respected them BIG time! Prediction SC5-Bulldawgs2 (maybe)

 

I watched Providence play SC and I've seen Butler play Prov twice, Weddington, Myers Park and Ardrey Kell. Bumgardner is absolutely awesome, but he's been beaten twice this year and I'm certain its been by teams who put the ball in play. The top of Prov order did not do that and that was the story of the game against SC. Prov was behind 2-1 after 4 because of Prov errors and had actually outhit SC til Mailman was removed. Butler has 3 pitchers who have been as good or better tham Mailman all year and SC is just not good enough outsude of MB to beat a Butler "team" that is better at every position other than Bumgardner. Granted if he throws like he did aginst Prov he'll be hard to beat, but Prov best hitters were lefty on lefty vs MB and Butler will not have that problem. Andrew Smith is much like Mailman, but he has gone 7 innings in almost every game in the best "top to bottom" conference in the state. The message - - Butlers pitching and hitting from 1 to 9 in the order will overcome MB. SC cannot compare 1 to 9 vs Butler nor can they compare defensively. All you have to do is watch pre-game warm ups and it will answer whose a better defensive team. In summary, if MB throws a better game against Butler than he did Prov SC will win, but I'm pretty sure Prov saw the best he's got. Butler puts the bat on the ball, SC defense let's MB down and Butler moves on. End of story!

 

OH YEAH its gametime, im thinking of bumgarner jokes already, all i can say is South in my opinion is going down it will be a close game but we all know Madison is beatable just watch i just hope i dont get chased by any SC fans, this seems like the biggest baseball game in a while im so HYPED

 

This should be a GREAT game....can't wait to see it. There will be so many fans from both sides you will not be able to think.....

BulldogFan3....save me and Braves a couple of seats.

 

Both games that Madison lost were really not his fault but the team's fault as a whole. In the game against East Rutherford where SC lost 2-1 South only had 4 hits with Madison going 3-3 and only 1 person getting 1 other hit which is totally inexcusable although I wish to take nothing away from Ryan Leach who pitched a great game himself.

In the game at AC Reynolds the defense made several key errors with at least 4 of the 5 runs scored by Asheville being unearned in the 5-3 loss.

However you win by the team and you die by the team so I'm not making any excuses because South got beat plain and simple. However, I wanted to let everyone know that you can't put the blame squarely on Madison for those loses.

All I know is the fans of SC have had this potential matchup in our minds since the brackets came out and we were ready to play the game last night. Whoever wins this game will have to be the heavy favorite to take the title this year although you can't overlook anyone this far into the playoffs. There will be probably 50 scouts at a minimum at the game since Madison is pitching and radar guns will be going off everywhere. I would assume that Butler is used to having a lot of scouts as well since they are such a good team.

If not it can be a little intimidating for the pitcher and sometimes the pitcher tries to overthrow. I have sit beside some of the scouts this year and Madison's FB ranges between 92 on the low side and 98 tops. You will see just about every Major League team represented at these games. He throws consistently around 93 - 95. Generally Madison gets stronger as the game gets longer so you had better try to get to him early.

Just to add a little extra hype Madison is ranked the #1 Left Handed HS Pitcher in America by Baseball America and is ranked the #4 best High School player in America overall. He has homerun power up to 525 feet. Just ask the people who saw Caldwell County's legion team play Kannapolis in the State Tournament last year when the ball was found on the other side of the highway in Thomasville in the best game I had ever witnessed between 2 great Legion teams.