Appreciating the pennant race of 2016

Appreciating the pennant race of 2016

There was a lot of teethgrinding and yelling when the Arkansas Activities Association decided to switch their playoff format once again in the summer of 2014.

In those meetings, they scrapped the power points system that gave Class 6A schools a bump for beating Class 7A schools in all sports, and focused instead on just beating teams in your classification to qualify for the state tournaments.

The results in football and basketball have been a bit of a mixed bag. The hot West Memphis-Marion hoops rivalry is still plenty heated, but the stakes haven’t been the same. That will change next year when the two schools will each be a member of Class 6A.

However, that change has done wonders for two sports that have always been affiliated with pennant races and big games at the end of the season: Baseball and softball.

For an example, you need to look no further than Marion. The baseball and softball teams got off to drastically different starts to their seasons, but saw everything morph once the third week of April turned up on the calendar.

The Marion baseball team lost their first 17 games, but after topping Mountain Home in their 6A-East opener, the Pats gained a new lease on life. Marion can’t nab the top spot in the state tournament after three straight 6A-East losses, but a sweep this week of Searcy would likely give Marion a No. 2 seed in the state, and a favorable matchup with a lower-seeded team from the south.

Searcy boasts arguably the best pair of starting pitchers in the 6A-East, but Marion controls its own destiny if it wants to make another appearance in the state tournament.

That’s all any team can ask for with one big week of games in front of it.

On the softball pitch, Marion has made state semifinal appearances the past two seasons, and looked like they would coast to a second straight No. 1 seed from the 6AEast after winning its first three 6A-East games by a combined 17 runs.

However, a home loss to Jonesboro has left the door cracked for the Lady Pats. Marion hasn’t assured itself of a postseason appearance yet, and while they still look good for the tournament and a top seed, nothing is certain ahead of their homeand- away contests against Searcy.

All said, I think that the great pennant chase of 2016 will be one of the better ones in recent memory. I’m still not a fan of having six games decide your teams’ postseason fate, but the switch did make the games more interesting and significant than they were before.

Chuck’’s Corrnerr

By Chuck Liiviingstton