Metro Sports Report

'Verb' would be proud of today's baseball

I’m not sure Metro area baseball is any better today than it was decades ago, but certainly the process of producing players is very different.

For you younger readers, you may be surprised to learn that at one time there was middle-school baseball. Back then, they were called junior high schools. Taft, Wilson, Roosevelt, McKinley, Harding and Franklin all had baseball teams when junior highs consisted of seventh, eighth and ninth grade students. Wilson and part of Taft and Roosevelt fed Jefferson High School, Harding and parts of Taft and Roosevelt fed Kennedy, and Washington drew from McKinley and Franklin.

Most junior high schools had their own diamonds. And there were tremendous rivalries. They were built as the result of kids living nearby each other but attending different schools, or guys who competed in the Cedar Hills League or the City League, perhaps on the same teams but then squaring off as a member of their middle school team.

Then it all changed. Middle-school baseball went by the wayside with the advent of such organizations as CABA, Babe Ruth, AAU and USSSA. Hand-picked teams were formed for competition in these organizations, often with players who would eventually attend the same high school. These teams would not only compete locally but travel across the state, and sometimes to bordering states for games.

Both high school feeder scenarios had, and still have, their benefits. Both have produced outstanding high school players, major-college prospects and even a professional signee here and there.

One guy who would be proud of the progress is Bob Vrbicek, for whom this week’s Metro baseball tournament is named. They called him “Verb.’’

J-Hawks' season ends in a shootout

The Jefferson boys soccer players sat in heavy silence on the bench after a heartbreaking 2-1 shootout loss to Marshalltown on Monday in the first round of the Class 3A substate tournament.

The season-ending loss dropped the J-Hawk to a 4-13 in a season marred by close loss after close loss.

“We lost another tough game,” said Coach John O’Connor. “That’s the story of our season, losing games that we have been in and dominated a lot of the game. We just haven't been able to finish it out. It has not been by a lack of effort, not by lack of good kids, it just wasn’t our year for finishing out games.”

Xavier frosh firing her way to the top

Shooting at clay targets with a 12-gauge shotgun may not be considered a glamour sport among Carly Berutti’s classmates at her urban high school. But for the 15-year-old Xavier freshman, trap shooting is a natural extension of her love of the great outdoors – so natural that she has quickly become the Metro area’s trap-shooting queen and one of the top
girls in the state.

A triplet, Carly has carved the most unusual path among the athletic Berutti kids. Her sister, Marisa, plays on Xavier’s varsity soccer team as a freshman, Carly notes with obvious pride. Brother Gino is a football player.

“I’m my dad’s hunting girl,” Berutti says. “I’ve been hunting with my dad since fourth grade with my shotgun. I just like hunting and the outdoors.”

Side by side with her father, Joe, and the family’s German shorthair, she has hunted deer – with shotgun and bow – pheasant, squirrel and turkey.

At last year’s freshman orientation, she stopped by a table with information about Xavier’s trap shooting club. “I went to a meeting and joined,” she recalls, thinking it would be a good way to meet people at her new school.

Soccer's most common injury to the shoulder

Soccer season has another couple weeks left, and so it’s still fitting to discuss the most common shoulder injury that occurs in high school soccer – the “shoulder separation.”

This painful injury can lead to future shoulder disability if not diagnosed properly and treated appropriately.

What exactly is a “shoulder separation”?

The shoulder is connected to the rest of the body via the clavicle (collarbone). This bone acts like a support strut in a racing car suspension, providing stability while allowing movement of the shoulder blade.

The acromio-clavicular (AC) joint is the joint where the collarbone meets the shoulder blade (on top of your shoulder at the end of your collarbone. If you grabbed your sternum (breastbone), go to the “other end” of the collar bone!).The AC joint is the area injured in what is commonly called a “shoulder separation”. For a closer look at the anatomy of this area, just type in “AC joint” on your favorite search engine to look at the images on the web.