attention, please

Millsaps is on its way to San Antonio today for an always compelling series against Trinity. Regardless of the sport, something interesting is bound to happen when these Southern Collegiate Athletic Conference rivals get together. This weekend's baseball series — single games Saturday and Sunday — matches teams tied for first in the SCAC West at 6-1. "We're heading into the lion's den," Millsaps coach Jim Page said. "But it's always fun playing those guys. If you're not looking forward to a game against Trinity, you shouldn't be doing this." Page's Majors are 11-5 overall, which has the coach a little disappointed. "We really haven't played well yet," he said. "You gotta think that when we start to play better, maybe it'll be something special." He has no complaints about the pitching. The staff has a 3.60 ERA. No. 1 starter Aaron Williams is 3-0 with a 3.10 ERA, and fifth-year senior Jason Riggins has been a revelation as a utility arm, posting a 2-0 record, one save and a 1.26 ERA in six appearances. "He's really been a critical factor," Page said. Defense let the Majors down in a 3-2 home loss to Huntingdon on Wednesday, but Page feels OK about the gloves. It's the bats that need to wake up. The Majors are hitting just .287 overall with the new, toned-down sticks. Senior Will Hawkins is raking at a cool .464 clip, but many are scuffling. Page has always liked to play aggressively on the bases, and that tactic is paying off in a big way this spring. The team has 52 stolen bases, led by Hawkins with 14. Six players have four or more steals. "Seven of the nine in our lineup are a real threat to steal," Page said. The running game could loom large against Trinity, which sports a 17-2 record and, like Millsaps, has designs on an NCAA Division III Tournament bid.

eye on ...

This is a spring of some import for Chris Coghlan in the Florida Marlins' camp. The onetime Ole Miss star is coming off knee surgery and moving from left to center field. He was the National League rookie of the year in 2009, when he hit. 321 with nine homers, 47 RBIs and 10 steals in 121 games. After a sluggish start last season, he was hitting .268 with five homers and eight steals in 91 games when he tore up his left knee during some postgame hi-jinks. His wheels are everything. He's the Marlins' leadoff batter in addition to his new duties patrolling the middle in the outfield. The Marlins are proceeding with caution this spring. Coghlan started back-to-back games for the first time Sunday and Monday, took Tuesday off and isn't in the lineup today. He told mlb.com on Tuesday that his repaired knee is making "steady improvement."

small wonders

Mississippi College appears to have found its stride, scoring 63 runs during its current four-game win streak. The Choctaws, scheduled to begin American Southwest Conference play this weekend at Louisiana College, are 7-6. Senior outfielder Brandon Benton was named the ASC East hitter of the week after going 9-for-15 with three homers in four games last week. The well-traveled Benton, a Pearl High alum who has also played at Hinds Community College and Belhaven, is hitting .435 for the season in eight games. ... Millsaps swept Austin College in a Southern Collegiate Athletic Conference series over the weekend to improve to 11-4 overall and 6-1 in the league. The number that jumps out for the Majors: 51. That's their stolen base total. Leading the way is senior Will Hawkins, better known for his power, with 13 steals. ... Belhaven (14-5) took Monday's rubber game against Loyola-New Orleans to move to 2-1 in the Southern States Athletic Conference. Josh Clarke, from Clinton via Hinds CC, got his third save in Monday's 6-3 win; he could be a key piece down the stretch for the Blazers. ... On the junior college front, Pearl River improved to 12-2 with a sweep of East Mississippi on Sunday. The Wildcats rode the pitching of Buck Bernard and Robert Marzoni. And Hinds (11-3) split a Monday doubleheader against defending national champ LSU-Eunice; the Eagles let a 3-1 lead get away in the seventh inning of Game 1 but bounced back for an 11-8 win in Game 2, getting a home run from Morris Grant.

and counting

We're one month out. Opening day for the Mississippi Braves is April 7 at Trustmark Park. New manager Rocket Wheeler takes the reins of a club that has made two postseason appearances in its six years of existence, the last in 2008. This could be a contending team, possibly featuring the United Nations Rotation (Colombia's Julio Teheran, Panama's Randall Delgado, the Dominican Republic's Arodys Vizcaino and Americans J.J. Hoover and Brett Oberholtzer — all top 10 prospects in the system) and some promising young position players (shortstop Tyler Pastornicky, outfielders Mycal Jones, Cory Harrilchak and Adam Milligan and second baseman Phil Gosselin). So, watch the standings. But watch the attendance figures, too. Not so much opening day, which will be a big number, but Games 3, 4 and 5 of that first series. Official attendance at the TeePee dipped to 2,620 last season. The regular season average has fallen each year since the club drew 3,847 in 2005. That's not good. M-Braves officials have made a concerted effort this off-season to boost ticket sales, hoping to reverse that trend. The first homestand might give an indication of where the number is headed.
P.S. Rashun Dixon, the former Terry High star, put up some numbers in a split squad game for Oakland on Sunday. Dixon, the A's No. 28 prospect, had a hit, scored a run and drove in two against Milwaukee. He played in low-A ball last year, so he's a few years away from The Show, but his career track bears watching.

on the buffet

The schedule serves up an appetizing slate of games for many of the state's colleges this weekend. (Weather permitting, of course. It's March in Mississippi, so anything can happen and probably will.) Still, here's the best of the menu: Ole Miss hosts Tulane for a three-game set starting tonight that could test the nationally ranked Rebels' mettle. Alcorn State is at Mississippi Valley for a three-game Southwestern Athletic Conference series that begins with a Saturday doubleheader. Jackson State is at SWAC rival Alabama State for single games on Saturday and Sunday. Belhaven and William Carey play their first Southern States Athletic Conference games, the nationally ranked Blazers (12-4) visiting Loyola-New Orleans today and Saturday (twinbill) and the Crusaders (8-6) traveling to Truett-McConnell for a game today and two on Saturday. Mississippi College, off to a scuffling start at 3-6, faces a non-conference road series against McMurry. The main dish for the weekend is cooking at Twenty Field in Jackson, where Millsaps will host Southern Collegiate Athletic Conference foe Austin College for a three-game set (two Saturday, one Sunday). The Majors are 9-4, 4-1 SCAC, and 5-0 at home. Will Hawkins, the senior thumper from Nettleton, is hitting .456 with two homers and 20 RBIs. Another appealing entree will be served up in Raymond, where Hinds Community College is hosting the Wes Cliburn Memorial Tournament. Nationally ranked HCC (10-2) is scheduled to play defending NJCAA champion LSU-Eunice (8-3) on Saturday at 6. Anybody hungry?

go crazy?

In the immortal words of Jack Buck: "I don't believe what I just saw." Tougaloo beat Belhaven at Smith-Wills Stadium today. For the first time ever. Granted, the Bulldogs' program hasn't been around that long, but it has established a legacy of losing. A lot. Put it this way, Belhaven, ranked 12th in the latest NAIA poll, has won more games this season (12) than Tougaloo has won in its history. The Bulldogs, 0-13 and outscored 135-24 this season before today's victory, were 0-77 all-time in the Gulf Coast Athletic Conference before winning a conference game last year. Belhaven was the GCAC champ in 2010. So this was monumentally historic. The final was 2-1. Belhaven, hitting .313 as a team, managed two infield singles against Tougaloo's Michael Langston, a little left-hander who baffled them with off-speed junk for nine innings. Langston, a senior from Chicago, threw about 125 pitches. He likely could've thrown 125 more. He never threw anything over 72 mph and operated in the 60s most of the time. He picked off two baserunners, and BU had another runner gunned down at third base on an attempted steal. The Blazers pushed across an unearned run in the first inning. Tougaloo tied it in the third on an RBI double by its imposing cleanup batter, William Walker. The Bulldogs took the lead in the eighth on a two-hit by Dustin Triplett. Langston, who came in with a 12.27 ERA in three previous games, made it stand up, stranding the tying run at third in the ninth. Where did this come from? Who knows? Stuff happens in baseball, as a shocked crowd at Smith-Wills today could attest.

changing places

There was a time — 2007, to be exact — when it appeared that Brandon Jones was on his way to being the Atlanta Braves' starting left fielder for years to come. Now, he's fighting for a backup job with the Milwaukee Brewers, his fourth team in about a year's time. Just hard to believe, really. The soft-spoken Jones, with his picturesque left-handed swing, hit .293 with 15 home runs, 74 RBIs and 12 stolen bases for the '07 Mississippi Braves, who rode his back to a first-half title in the Southern League South. He went to Triple-A and hit .300 with four homers and 26 RBIs there, then got a cup of coffee in Atlanta. He got another brief look with the Braves in 2008 but apparently didn't impress the right people. Atlanta signed aging veteran Garret Anderson to play left field in 2009, and Jones seemingly became an afterthought. Though he batted .257 in his 51 big-league games with Atlanta, Jones was waived prior to the 2010 season and claimed by Pittsburgh, which gave him a short look last spring before demoting him to the minors. Jones, perhaps disheartened, struggled with the Pirates, who traded him to Detroit late last summer. He became a free agent this past off-season and signed with the Brewers. He's in their camp now, battling the likes of Brandon Boggs and Chris Dickerson for the fourth outfield job. Jones is only 27, so he's still got time to find his niche. There was magic in his swing in 2007. It's still gotta be in there somewhere.
P.S. Ole Miss, unranked in any preseason polls, has cracked the Top 30 (at No. 28) in the latest Collegiate Baseball rankings. The Rebels are off to a 7-1 start and took two of three at Houston last weekend, a nice showing.