North Sunflower Academy Rebel baseball gets underway and hits the road on Friday with a 4:00 p.m. first pitch against Regents Academy. First year Head Coach Anthony Rivera has 18 players on his roster and has been working them hard in the off-season.
“We’ve got a mix of JV and varsity and I’m looking forward to coaching them this season,” Coach Rivera said. “Our first game is Friday and we travel to Oxford to play Regents.”
With two seniors, Nick Billhofer and Dalton Hollis, the Rebels are a young team with players in sixth and seventh grades on the roster.
“Brandon Daniels is one of our pitchers and catcher and our two seniors, I’m looking for them to contribute very well. We’ve got good senior leadership from those two,” Coach Rivera said. “Hollis plays shortstop and Nick starts at catcher. Grayson Barnett is an eighth grader but he plays for the Golden Spikes Travel Team. He’s a good little pitcher. I actually have a sixth grader that played on our travel team over the summer. I’m waiting for those guys to make a little noise.”
Coach Rivera looks to have a balanced team as that’s the experience he’s had in both high school and college.
“We’ll have a little bit of game and a little bit of a long game but the main thing I’m stressing to my guys is positive attitude. Baseball is chess and not checkers,” he said. “If you get frustrated and get down on yourself, you’ll never battle back. Everything in baseball has to be calm and positive and you’ve got to have fun, of course.”
The Rebels have a 15-game schedule planned with eight district games.
