Good news for Navarre. The Raider baseball and softball programs now have their coaches in place.
I’d like to think everyone is happy with the two who have been chosen to fill those roles, but this is high school sports we are talking about, so maybe not.
Some athletes are clear-cut, no doubt about it Division I type of athletes. You look at one of them and you are like ‘that kid is going to be big-time special at a place like Alabama, Florida State, LSU or Georgia.’
I’ve seen a handful of those athletes over the years.
Both sides in the Pensacola Sports Association All-Star Softball Game earlier this month were missing players. I think I counted nine missing in action from the East and about half of the 24-player roster unavailable on the West squad.
I wasn’t at the baseball all-star game, but word is the East had to give up some of its players so the West could have enough players to fill out a team.
Sports is serious business at times. Check that. Almost all the time.
We rank teams, athletes and way too often we project the odds of a young athlete being the next big thing at the college or pro level.
We already live in a world, at least here in Florida, where athletes can transfer freely thanks to the free agency style set-up here in the state. We are about to live in a world high school athletes can get paid.
Never did I think I’d be typing those words out in a column at any point in my lifetime. Just goes to show you to never say never.
We are still a couple of months away from the first season in more than a decade of Navarre Raider football without Jay Walls on the sideline.
But what we’ve seen so far through spring football is the indication that the Raiders are going to be just fine as they continue to work in preparation for their first season under the direction Garrett Bagley.
I’m not complaining that the spring football game between Navarre and Pace was postponed a couple of weeks ago.
I was driving back from Fort Myers after covering a state baseball championship game the night before.
Sports seasons are complete and the only thing remaining for the senior athletes in the area is to walk across the stage and receive their high school diploma.
They’ve spent the last four years representing their schools on football fields, baseball fields, softball fields, basketball courts, tennis courts, volleyball courts and more.
Jordan Jefferson stopped by a youth football camp held after the Navarre Raiders’ Saturday spring practice the other week.
He had the attention of every young player there, especially since it was only a few weeks ago that Jefferson was taken in the fourth round of the NFL Draft by the Jacksonville Jaguars.
I wish Santa Rosa County would get out of its own way and figure out how to make an aquatics center happen.
Before the Dallas Cowboys win their next Super Bowl would be ideal. Well, on that note, you’ve got some time to get it done.
