[baller1989]

Some of the arguments being made are legitimate on both sides. Even those people that do not want class systems for baseball would be open to it if done correctly.

Obviously, it is possible for a 1A or 2A school to catch lightning and win it all in a tournament setting. The point is, they shouldn't have to "catch lightning." Right now, those schools feel defeated before they even arrive at the state tournament.

Once you start looking at this argument you have to take in and factor all variables. Which means, monetary advantages, location advantages, facility advantages, etc. All of that plays a role with how teams finish every year. The reason LC has defied odds and JC and Pikeville, etc., is because they have done their best to give those players everything other schools have. That is why when their talent matches their work ethic, they can beat anybody.

I have a big issue with the argument of "25 players = 25 players." It's very silly. I know of several schools around the Louisville area that have a freshman team, a JV team, and a varsity team. They have separate coaches for each of those teams that don't even help with varsity. They all have their own schedules and that's that. In some cases, each one of those teams have 25 players. A couple of those schools are not even 6A. Now flip that around. I also know of several of teams in eastern KY, Winchester, Mount Sterling, even Lexington area that have 25 players. However, the difference is they have a total of 35 between their JV and Varsity. 95% of high school teams do not have freshman teams anymore because of numbers. So to assume that every school has 25 v. 25 opportunities like everyone else is not only wrong, it's very uninformed.

may or may not been discussed yet, but another issue is not only facilities, but also, coaching staff. in a small school you pay the head coach maybe $2000/ yr to coach and the assistant doesn't get paid anything in a sport that you really need to coach year round, (cause competition does it) which doesn't really attract the most qualified. you may get a teacher that played tee ball back in the day and he is willing to make a schedule for the team so he gets the position. unless you've been around these small schools you really don't understand the hills all have to climb to make it competitive against the larger schools and that is just to compete. "put a quality brand on the field", we are not even talking about winning titles, just playing against the big boys and not get hurt or embarrassed. funding is major issue, as small schools don't have any funding and don't have a facility or a backing from admin or community then their backs are against the wall. with this all said, this is why, we somewhat are looked upon as not being competitive at the high school level cause when you have 5a vs. 1a and a scout happens to show to that game and witnesses 1a that doesn't have matching uniforms and can't catch a ground ball or fly ball then the word spreads to others about the lack of quality ball in the state etc.,.... very many issues that large schools really don't have to put up with. I appreciate the smalls schools that do things right and work hard for the kids but there are schools, large and small, that don't care as much as they should for the kids but it is mostly in the smaller rural areas of the state that have small schools w/ low economic backgrounds in their communities. we don't need to bring up Johnson Central or Lawrence County w/ these issues because they are larger county schools that have funding from the state and don't have the problems these schools I'm talking about have. Pikeville has a much better economic base and can offer things other communities can't.