WO-S ready for new year with new coach

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WO-S ready for new year with new coach

Gabriel Pruett

The Orange Leader

WEST ORANGE — The West Orange-Stark Mustangs are preparing this baseball season for the future with one thing in mind, teamwork.

First-year head coach Derrick Rivers believes team unity will go along way in deciding if his first Mustangs team has success.

“The first thing we have to have is a team concept,†Rivers said on Monday. We are teaching basic teamwork and if we have that we will achieve more.â€

The first year on the job for Rivers means he will be learning just as much as his team.

It might not always mean success, but it doesn’t have to mean complete failure either.

“With a first year coach and these guys being with me for just this year, we have to maintain our composure this season,†Rivers explained. “At all times we have to keep our team unity. This is going to be a really tough district. There is Bridge City and throw in Jasper, Silsbee and Orangefield.

“Being at West Orange, you know we are going to have great athletes but we still have to work. Our No. 1 goal is to be to compete night in and night out. It is all in what you learn each game.â€

Names WO-S fans will be familiar with are Terry Veitch, Andre Bevil, Justin Gearhart, Will Shafer, Earl and Seth Thomas and Jacoby Franks..

“Bevil did not play last year but we are certainly looking for good things out of him,†Rivers said. “Jacoby has been around baseball his whole life so that will be a plus. If you look at what we have, we should be playing a lot of small ball this season, even in a 300-foot ballpark. A lot of the fields we will be playing at are small but we still want to use a lot of fundamentals this season.

“We have tons of speed but we need to turn that speed into baseball speed. Just because you run a 4.2 in the 40-yard dash does not mean you are going to steal bags.â€

Franks, Earl Thomas, Veitch and Michael Theriot were all honorable mention All-District selections a year ago.

The Mustangs will have to deal with the losses of Nick Ayers and Eric Sparks to graduation along with Tim McClelland who manned the outfield.

WO-S is set to scrimmage Beaumont Ozen tonight at Ronnie Anderson Park and gets its first crack at real action Feb. 20 when they travel to face Little Cypress-Mauriceville.

After heading to Crosby, the first tournament the Mustangs participate in will be from March 1-3 at the Louisiana-Lafayette Tournament.

District action opens up Mar. 6 for the Mustangs when they play host to Kirbyville.

WO-S then will head to the Bridge City Tournament Mar. 8-10 before returning to district action Mar. 13 when they hit the road to take on Silsbee.

“Right now we are working to lessen the gap between our worst player and our best player,†Rivers said. “We need our worst player to be right behind that best player in performance. This will always be a football school but we are starting to build some depth on the baseball team. That will help us all the way around.â€