In case you missed it, Jericho Scott is a 9 year old with a 40mph fastball.
There has been some controversy this week about him being “banned” from pitching in a local independent youth baseball league (not Little League nor Ripken).
The problem I have isn’t that he throws fast – we all faced that kid that threw “hard” or the scary lefty or “the big kid” – that’s all part of being a kid. My problem was with his usage.
August 9th he pitched 5 innings. The next day he pitched 3 more. On the 13th five more.
That’s a lot. That’s more than Joba could pitch and more than the Mets want Pelfrey to pitch. I know that when we were kids you’d go out and throw a wiffle ball 300 times every single day all summer – but it’s different when you are in a game setting. Too many coaches try to relive their World Seies fantasies (oh say even having a youth tournament televised on ESPN) through kids. They are kids.
Here’s a link to a reporter that did his homework, and appears to get the story right. Long story short, Jerico is a #4 pitcher on a Pony League team and is also playing in this low-level league for some reason. And that’s where the trouble starts….
http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/page2/story?page=080827/kreidler