Tag Archives: Meridian Community College

25 Jun

there and here

Baseball weaves a web of connections that never fails to surprise. Take a trip to Vancouver. Go to a Canadians game at Nat Bailey Stadium. Who’s managing the home team? Rich Miller, a member of the original Jackson Mets team of 1975. Miller played parts of four seasons for the JaxMets. He is in his second stint with the Canadians, a short-season Class A affiliate of the Toronto Blue Jays. He won a championship with the team in 2011. … Minnesota Twins fans should be pumped today. Former Southern Miss star Brian Dozier hit a tie-breaking home run — his 13th of the year — in the eighth inning as the Twins beat Cleveland 4-2 on Saturday and moved within a half-game of the first-place Indians in the American League Central. Dozier told The Associated Press it was “the most high energy game we’ve had in a while.” Meanwhile, down in rookie ball, Mississippi State product Brent Rooker hit his first pro home run in a 4-for-5 game for Elizabethton. Rooker, the 35th overall pick by the Twins in the recent draft, is 5-for-11 in three games as a pro. “The hard work went in this past season at school,” Rooker told milb.com. An advanced player at age 22, Rooker could move up quickly in the Twins’ system. … Ex-Meridian Community College star Corey Dickerson, bidding for an All-Star Game berth, belted his 17th homer for Tampa Bay; he leads the All-Mississippi Home Run Derby. Former State standout Mitch Moreland got his 10th dinger for Boston. … Ole Miss alum Lance Lynn surrendered seven runs for the second straight game as St. Louis lost to Pittsburgh 7-3. Lynn (5-5) has yielded 20 home runs this season.

19 Jun

numbers to crunch

29 – Stolen bases, a total which leads the majors, by ex-Taylorsville High star Billy Hamilton, who got one Sunday to end a 13-game drought. Hamilton also had three hits, two runs and an RBI in fading Cincinnati’s loss to the Los Angeles Dodgers.
4 – Home runs allowed, a career-high, by Ole Miss alum Lance Lynn in 4 2/3 innings in St. Louis’ 8-5 loss to Baltimore. Lynn (5-4) yielded seven runs all told.
7 – Homers on the year for ex-UM star Seth Smith, who hit a leadoff bomb for Baltimore, the first of the four Lance Lynn allowed for St. Louis. Smith, batting .271, had two other hits and scored three times.
91 – Hits, most in the American League, by Meridian Community College product Corey Dickerson, who tallied three on Sunday. He is batting .330.
7 – Runs allowed in four games at Target Field by Cleveland in a sweep of Minnesota that moved the Indians into first place in the AL Central. Former Ole Miss star Mickey Callaway, the Indians’ pitching coach, saw his staff’s ERA drop to 3.93, tied for third-best in the AL.
3 – Hits in 13 at-bats in the Cleveland series by ex-Southern Miss standout Brian Dozier, who had a homer and two RBIs for Minnesota, which had a 2-game division lead before the Tribe arrived in town.
34 – Wins in 70 games for the Mississippi Braves, who completed the first half of the Southern League season with a 6-3 win against Montgomery at Trustmark Park. The M-Braves will send seven players to the SL All-Star Game in Pensacola on Tuesday.
6 – Strikeouts in five scoreless innings by USM’s Nick Sandlin in his Cape Cod League debut for Hyannis.

14 Jun

blast off

Time to check in on the All-Mississippi Home Run Derby. Four from the Magnolia State went yard in MLB games on Tuesday: Corey Dickerson, Brian Dozier, Mitch Moreland and Jarrod Dyson. Former Meridian Community College star Dickerson, leader of the pack and a likely All-Star, hit his 15th for Tampa Bay to move two ahead of Mississippi State alum Hunter Renfroe. Southern Miss’ Brian Dozier moved into third with his 11th, one of Minnesota’s franchise-record 28 hits in a 20-7 victory over Seattle. Southwest Mississippi CC product Dyson hit his career-high third bomb for the Mariners in that crazy game at Target Field. Ex-State star Moreland belted No. 9 for Boston, matching Ole Miss alum Zack Cozart of Cincinnati for fourth on the derby chart. P.S. Milwaukee placed MSU alum Brandon Woodruff on the disabled list with the hamstring problem that caused him to miss what would have been his big league debut on Tuesday. Odd note: Ex-Petal High star Anthony Alford, shortly after debuting with Toronto, landed on the DL, where Ole Miss products Bobby Wahl, who debuted last month with Oakland, and Stuart Turner, a rookie with Cincinnati, are also stuck.

30 May

star power

Much can and will happen between now and the time the All-Star Game rosters are finalized in mid-July. But barring some calamity, Corey Dickerson will be in Miami for the Midsummer Classic on July 11. The McComb native and ex-Meridian Community College star is batting .345 with 12 homers, 25 RBIs and 38 runs in 50 games for Tampa Bay. The lefty-hitting outfielder/DH leads the American League in hits with 70. After a lackluster first season with the Rays, he has erupted in Year 2. “Hitting to all fields has probably been as important as anything,” Rays manager Kevin Cash said of Dickerson in a Tampa Bay Times story. If Dickerson makes the All-Star Game, he would be just the second Mississippi native to do so in the last 10 years. Brian Dozier (Tupelo/Fulton) got in as an injury replacement pick – a deserving one — in 2015. For the record, Mississippi hasn’t produced an abundance of All-Stars in recent times, though there have been a few of note. Roy Oswalt (Kosciusko/Weir) made three straight appearances in the game from 2005-07. Ellis Burks (Vicksburg) appeared in two, 1990 and 1996. Dave Parker (Calhoun City/Grenada) made seven, the last in 1990. Greenville native Frank White was a five-time All-Star, making his last appearance in 1986. George Scott, also from Greenville, made three Classics, his final one coming in 1977, and Chet Lemon (Jackson) got the call three times, as well, the last in 1984.

22 May

big league chew

Mitch Moreland, one of several Boston hitters caught in a power drought, is showing signs of breaking out. The former Mississippi State star from Amory homered for the third straight game on Sunday in a 12-3 Red Sox win at Oakland. He now has five on the year. The Red Sox, trying to keep pace with Baltimore and New York in the American League East, rank 29th in the big leagues with 38 homers. … Corey Dickerson, generating a lot of All-Star buzz these days, got two more hits for Tampa Bay on Sunday, boosting his MLB-leading hit total to 59. The Meridian Community College product is batting .347 (ninth in the big leagues) and slugging .635 (eighth). He has 11 homers, five in his last 10 games. … Former Ole Miss star Zack Cozart is hitting .351 (fourth in MLB) for Cincinnati. He didn’t play Sunday (sore wrist) as the tumbling Reds lost for the eighth time in nine games. … East Central CC alum Tim Anderson is 12-for-26 with three homers in six games since returning from a trip home to Birmingham for the funeral of a close friend. Anderson, in an early season slump, is now hitting .264 with five bombs and 11 RBIs for the Chicago White Sox. … Ex-Petal High standout Anthony Alford took an 0-for-3 on Sunday and is still looking for his first big league hit since last week’s call-up by Toronto. … Baltimore’s Adam Jones hit his 124th homer at Camden Yards on Sunday, equaling ex-State star Rafael Palmeiro for the most in the Orioles’ home park.

19 May

have a day

The numbers are good, very good: .367, six home runs, 15 RBIs, 12 runs. The numbers were posted by a collection of Mississippians in the majors – 12 of them – on Thursday night. Collectively, the 12 who played went 18-for-49. Adam Frazier (Mississippi State) and Tim Anderson (East Central Community College) had three-hit games. Frazier drove in four runs. He and Anderson homered, as did Seth Smith (Ole Miss), Hunter Renfroe (State), Mitch Moreland (State) and Jarrod Dyson (Southwest CC). Dyson scored three times and stole two bases. Frazier, Anderson, Billy Hamilton (Taylorsville) and Chris Coghlan (Ole Miss) rapped doubles. Zack Cozart (Ole Miss) had two hits and an RBI. Tyler Moore (State) and Stuart Turner (Ole Miss) struck out in pinch-hit appearances, but every Mississippian who started got at least one knock, save for Brian Dozier (Southern Miss). He had a tough day, going 0-for-9 in a doubleheader, though he did contribute a sac fly. All in all, a very good day for the Magnolia State boys. And the hottest hitter of them all, Corey Dickerson (Meridian CC, .335, nine homers, 18 RBIs), didn’t have a game on Thursday. P.S. Baseball America’s latest Top 500 draft prospects list shows just two Mississippians: State’s Brent Rooker at No. 64 and Jake Mangum at 160.

15 May

show stoppers

Tampa Bay can’t be too happy with its record – 19-21, fourth in the American League East – but has to be thrilled with the production it’s getting from Corey Dickerson. The Meridian Community College product, in his second season with the Rays, is batting .340 with a .576 slugging percentage. He extended his current hitting streak to eight games on Sunday with a 4-for-6 effort in an 11-2 win against Boston at wet, windy Fenway Park. He has six homers, 13 RBIs and 21 runs. The lefty-hitting outfielder/DH belted 24 homers for the Rays in 2016 but hit only .245 after coming over in a trade with Colorado. … Ole Miss alum Drew Pomeranz took the loss for the Red Sox, departing with triceps stiffness after yielding two runs in three innings. He is now 3-3 with a 5.29 ERA. … Ex-Mississippi State star Tyler Moore’s 25th career MLB homer and fourth as a pinch hitter carried Miami to a 3-1 win over Atlanta. Moore smacked an R.A. Dickey knuckleball out of Marlins Park in the seventh inning, accounting for all of Miami’s runs. Moore is hitting .357 over his two stints with the Marlins this season, serving mainly as a pinch hitter. “I love being in the big leagues,” he told The Associated Press. “Whatever is going to keep me here, I like.” … Former Southwest Mississippi CC standout Jarrod Dyson hit his first homer of the year for Seattle at Toronto’s Rogers Centre. It was his eighth career home run and the first in a park other than Kansas City’s Kauffman Stadium, where he spent the first seven seasons of his career. … Hunter Renfroe went deep for San Diego, the sixth homer of the year for the State product but first since April 26. The rookie right fielder is batting .209 with 13 RBIs. … Among the major leaguers wearing No. 2 on Sunday, the day the New York Yankees retired Derek Jeter’s old number, were former Southern Miss star Brian Dozier and ex-UM standout Zack Cozart, both of whom came up as shortstops during Jeter’s heyday.

02 Apr

let’s get it started

It’s here. Opening Day. New York Yankees vs. Tampa Bay Rays. Tropicana Field. OK, there’s no mystique and aura – or even sunshine — at The Trop, but it’s still Opening Day. And the first game of the 2017 season (noon, ESPN) could give us a matchup of Mississippi natives. McComb’s Corey Dickerson is expected to be in the Rays’ lineup as the DH batting leadoff. Gulfport’s Jonathan Holder is working out of the Yankees’ bullpen. Dickerson, a lefty hitter, is a veteran of 413 big league games and has a .279 career average. In his first season in Tampa in 2016, the Meridian Community College alum batted .245 with 24 homers. Holder, a right-hander, pitched in eight games (5.40 ERA) for the Yankees last summer and is still classified as a rookie. Drafted out of Mississippi State in 2014, he posted a 2.50 ERA (and a bunch of strikeouts) as he rose through the Yankees’ system. He pitched in Atlanta in the soft opening of SunTrust Park on Friday night; he wasn’t sharp. P.S. Ex-Ole Miss standout Chris Coghlan signed a minor league deal with Toronto and, according to reports, will start the season with Triple-A Buffalo. He had been released by Philadelphia. … Itawamba Community College product Desmond Jennings was given his release by Cincinnati.

13 Jan

the madding crowd

A week ago, Corey Dickerson was penciled in as Tampa Bay’s starting left fielder. Today, the former Meridian Community College star from McComb may not be so sure where he stands. With spring training camps opening in about a month, the Rays appear overrun with outfielders. Mallex Smith, the ex-Mississippi Braves star who arrived in a Wednesday trade, and reported free agent signee Colby Rasmus join a crowd that includes Dickerson, Kevin Kiermaier, Steven Souza Jr., Mikie Mahtook and Nick Franklin. Kiermaier is the likely starter in center. Otherwise, who knows? The Rays may be planning to move someone, though it would be a surprise if they dealt Dickerson, who is only 27 and entering just his fifth MLB season. He delivered power (24 home runs, 36 doubles) in his first year in Tampa after coming over in a trade from Colorado. Though he hit just .245, that could at least partly be attributed to changing home parks and leagues. Dickerson, a .279 career hitter, has always drawn raves for his abilities with the bat, and he has said that he wants to win a batting title. Because defense is not his strong suit, Dickerson figures to get a lot of at-bats at DH, as he did in 2016. Then again, he does have trade value. It’s a situation that bears watching in the coming weeks.

14 Dec

moving on

After an unproductive year in Atlanta’s system, Tyler Moore has moved on to Miami. The former Northwest Rankin High, Meridian Community College and Mississippi State slugger signed a minor league contract with the Marlins on Tuesday. The initial reports did not indicate whether the right-handed hitting first baseman/outfielder will get an invite to big league spring training. Moore, who hit 24 homers in 277 games over four seasons with Washington, was on the disabled list much of 2016 after the Braves acquired him in a trade. He batted .229 with three homers in 25 games for Triple-A Gwinnett. The Marlins appear set at first base with Justin Bour and have Giancarlo Stanton and Marcell Ozuna at the corner outfield spots. But Moore could provide power off the bench.