Baseball Question for Charlotte Observer readers?

Without a doubt, in the last 8-10 years the baseball in this area has exploded with tremendous talent. If we had to depend on the paper coverage of high school baseball no one would know. Everyday i read coverage on something dealing with Football and Basketball and their seasons is long over. Their is even more coverage of Soccer and Lacrosse than High School baseball. Is it because the coaches and AD's are not promoting the game? Someone please help me with this question.

 

It is a real shame. It seems to me attendance is up at most games. We have had a parade of state chamionships in the Observer area also. The interest seems to be growing, but the coverage is lacking. We are almost halfway thru and no new sweet 16? It is sad.

 

there hasnt been a new 16 since 2/10 which was preseason. What a shame. every now and then you see a boxscore in paper. only paper thats on top of baseball is salisbury post they have great articles. Statesville record and Landmark is always a couple days behind. and Charlotte Observer has box scores and is still talking bout football recruits and basketball games.

 

Like you said, the Observer covers basketball/football well, so the lack of baseball coverage isn't lack of manpower, its got to be lack of interest among Observer staff plain and simple.

Last year, Cliff Merhtons (sp?) did a great job, not sure where/what he's doing this year. I don't live in Rowan County, but occasionally I brag on the Salisbury Post for 2 reasons: 1) because the Sal.Post deserves the props, and 2) in hopes someone at the CO will take a hint.

Its truly a shame for the Charlotte area baseball players, because Charlotte baseball has been very very good in recent years. Thank God for websites like TBR, right?

 

Folks at the Observer will probably tell you that it's lack of space or manpower to get the informtation. I think the best thing to do is email and/or call them. If enough folks did, they might realize there is enough interest in baseball to make the effort. I'm just glad to see they finally figured out there is more than one college baseball team in their circulation area.

 

2 or 3 years ago South Caldwell and East Rutherford were playing each other in the Shelby Easter tournament. I believe they were both nationally ranked at the time. The CO gave the game zero coverage. I e-mailed Langston Wertz about it and his reply was fans need to let them know when such a game is being played. ??????? Had that been say, Indy and Butler in football.........
How many weeks are we into baseball season and they still have a pre-season Sweet 16? That's it. No updates, whereas football and basketball are updated weekly.

 

If people want to contact the Observer to try to bring about some change, you need to aim high (all the way to the top). Most newspaper people believe they support balance and fairness and that is what this is about. Langston Wertz and Cliff (wherever he went) won't push for change while they are trying to not be the victims of the next cutback.

Did anyone notice how the Observer went overboard to promote girls basketball over boys basketball for the entire season?....girls boxscores first all season, big feature stories with pictures of a 48-42 girls game and smaller stories and no pictures from the big boys game on the same day. Boys coverage picked up late in the season. Just runaway political correctness, I guess.

Langston has a nice sweet 16 pre-season video report with team by team analysis by Danny Hignight and Hal Bagwell on the observer website (prep insiders, I think)

 

We went through this last year and I'm sure nothing has changed with the Observer since then! IMO it's Bull****!!!!!!! They say that they don't have enough staff to cover the games. Well, ....... it seems to me that they do a great job with football and other sports. Other than a few articles about the guys at AK, (they had to win the State championship to get noticed) there is nothing. This area has a lot of talent that they could write about, but unfortunately they choose to ignore these players and give them the props they deserve. All I can say, ... is that I'm glad we have this forum and people like Braves and Mincmi to help keep us informed.

 

High School Soccer

Charlotte Observer consulted with a past soccer coach to write a weekly column on Boys High School Soccer this past fall. Not a soccer fan but read because it was high school sports and looked for familiar names or big games coming up. My idea is to get Mincmi to do the same thing for baseball. He knows all the players and games going on in the area. My vote is to hire him.

 

If you are in the South Charlotte/Northern Union County area and you have a good story idea in baseball, a simple email to me and The South Charlotte Sports Report will certainly look to provide coverage. We want human interest stories, athlete of the week nominations, player profile ideas, etc.

In my issue Wednesday, look for information on both of the big Easter Tournaments, a male athlete of the week from the Butler Baseball team and a story on my 2nd Annual Battle of the Border All Star Baseball and Softball All Star Showcase.


We love all youth sports, but we admit, with a 6 year old baseball player at home, we love the game and all the kids that play it in the area!