The 13U Demopolis All Stars Baseball team is in the process of playing a best 3-out-of-5 series against Bibb County for the District 10 Title, and both teams will represent District 10 in the Babe Ruth State Tournament in the coming weeks, which Demopolis will host July 17.

Head Coach Derek Moody feels that his team’s main strength is is their offensive tactics, particularly their pitching, with “seven good pitchers on the team to count on,” and several good base runners to score more points.

In preparation for their pitching, with only two practices since their tournament season began, Moody has made sure the players take time to stretch their arms out, stay limber, and practice their pitching technique.

Moody said the team has been working on patience with their players, “trying to get our kids to not swing at pitches out of zone, to feel out a pitcher from the opposing team and pick the right pitches to swing at.”

Moody said many of his hitters have improved and should be more than prepared for the state tournament.

When asked if he felt that being the host team for the tournament put more pressure on his players, he replied that he didn’t “think there’s any pressure at all. If we win, we win, if we don’t we’re going to have fun anyway. We’ll just let the chips fall where they may.”

Moody added that his primary strategy was “to make sure our pitchers can keep the batters from the other team off balance at plate, keep them guessing, and identify the more aggressive swingers and use our pitching skill against them.”

As the 13 and under age bracket, this group has spent the past year playing on a field larger than the kind used for younger age groups, which Moody said has posed some interesting challenges.

“But throughout the year they’ve been able to become accustomed to this size field,” he said.

Moody feels that this size field “sort of evens the playing field” between smaller and larger teams, and this might come to be an advantage later in tournament season.