Craven Stadium

August 28, 2022

Former Ramseur man runs summer baseball circuit for college-age players

Bob Sutton Sports Alec Allred, College baseball, Craven Stadium, Eastern Randolph Post 81, Faith Christian, Old North State League, summer college baseball

Alec Allred oversees the Old North State League.

RAMSEUR – Alec Allred is making a career out of baseball and it’s not on the field.

He’s the president of the Old North State League, a summer college circuit that wrapped up what he called a successful season earlier this summer.

“This is my full-time job now, trying to coordinate everything,” Allred said. “It’s a lot that goes into it, but it’s a ton of fun.”

Allred, 27, is from Ramseur and a 2014 graduate of Faith Christian. His family has largely overseen Eastern Randolph Post 81’s program on the American Legion level in recent years.

So finding a role in baseball seemed like a natural pursuit, Allred said. After high school, he had a redshirt year at North Carolina A&T followed by a season at Rockingham Community College and then a couple of seasons with Division III Peace College. Then came time in some independent leagues.

“I’m done playing,” he said. “I held on as long as I could.”

He saw other opportunities, particularly when it came to filling a niche for college-aged players in a wooden bat league. The ONSL began with eight teams and 125 players in 2019, using two fields. One of those was Craven Stadium in Ramseur.

Then during the 2020 pandemic-ravaged season, the ONSL fielded eight teams with bigger rosters and spread out.

“Those other leagues shut down and we were getting guys who had a higher calibre (of experience),” Allred said.

The Ramseur site is no longer used in the ONSL, but the 2022 version of the league had 13 teams with about 400 players. Last Monday, another team was added with a club in Clayton.

Allred, who now lives in Whispering Pines and conducts baseball lessons in the offseason, said he could envision the league growing to 18 teams.

It takes about $40,000 annually to run each team. Players are required to pay to play, but that might tend to create a commitment to stick without throughout the two-month season. Host families help with out-of-area players.

“We’re climbing and slowly getting better players,” Allred said. “My goal is to make it free for players. … You’re always trying to be better and get the league to new heights,”

The venues used by the league are vastly different from city to city. The High Point Hushpuppies play at Truist Point, which is the permanent home of the Atlantic League’s High Point Rockers. High school fields are used in Sanford and Shallotte, while facilities are well past their primes in places such as Reidsville and Swepsonville.

“There’s definitely a big variety of stadiums,” Allred said. “You have some old mill-league fields.”

Rosters generally hold about 30-some players.

Most of the ONSL players come from Division II, Division III or junior colleges – or are about to join teams on those levels. Allred said he has embraced an underdog mentality.

“I do get a little partial to the smaller-school guys,” he said.

Largely, players compete for teams that are local to where they live. About 25 percent of players come from out of the area, Allred said.

The Sandhills Bogeys, who are based in Pinehurst, won the 2022 championship, beating the Hendersonville Honeycrisps in the final.

June 8, 2022

Post 81 takes satisfaction by topping county rival Post 45

Bob Sutton Sports American Legion baseball, Craven Stadium, Post 45, Post 81, randolph county

Shortstop Nate Gardner played a key role for Post 81 in its victory against Randolph County Post 45. (PJ Ward-Brown/North State Journal file photo)

RAMSEUR – It felt like an important game for Eastern Randolph Post 81 in the American Legion rematch with in-county rival Randolph County Post 45.

The outcome seemed huge as well.

“It’s big for Post 81 and Eastern Randolph district,” said center fielder Brody Gardner. “We don’t do it very often.”

That’s because Post 81 pulled off a 15-6 victory Tuesday night at Craven Stadium.

This was no sure-thing result. A nine-run outburst in the bottom of the sixth inning snapped a tie and completed an impressive comeback.

The result avenged a loss from a week earlier.

“It’s always nice to beat a rival,” Post 81 pitcher / center fielder Luke Thomas said. “They’re really good. They’ve got hitters all over the place. They got us the first time. It’s nice to put no doubt about this one (with the huge sixth inning).”

Post 81 head coach Nate Cockman said it had been at least five years since Post 81 won a game against Randolph County.

“That’s something about our guys, they know it doesn’t take a lot to show effort,” Cockman said. “I think our guys felt like they had more to prove.”

It could be the kind of boost that Post 81 (5-6, 2-1 Area 3) can use to create momentum. Because of evolving player availability, Cockman said his lineup has been different for every game.

“We started off a little rough,” Gardner said of the season. “This opened our eyes that we can play with just about everybody.”

Post 45 (6-3, 1-1) is traditionally one of the strongest teams in the region and that might prove to be the case again.

Randolph County won 8-7 against Eastern Randolph on May 31 on Josh Meadows’ game-winning hit in a game played at Southwestern Randolph High School, which Post 45 used as a temporary home field during McCrary Park renovations.

Tuesday night’s nine-run uprising began with three runs scoring without the benefit of a hit. Then Karson Rickman, Matt Murchison and Nate Gardner all drove in runs with singles followed by Thomas’ two-run single amid more Post 45 miscues.

“It’s pretty exciting to beat these guys,” said catcher Parker Evans, a second-year player with the club.

Post 45 led 6-2 through five innings, aided by Blake Marsh’s opposite-field home run down the left-field line in the fourth.

Eastern Randolph prevented more damage in the fifth, in part because Post 45 speedster Adam Cole reached on an infield single but was erased when he was thrown out by Evans attempting to steal second base.

Post 81 pulled even with a four-run fifth, with TJ McGraw hammering a two-run homer and Brody Gardner following with a solo shot. Rickman’s double tied the score.

It also marked the Post 45 debut for Braylen Hayes, who three days earlier was finishing the prep portion of his career on a Randleman’s Class 2-A state championship team. Hayes was the Randolph County starting center fielder and made a brief appearance on the mound during the rough bottom of the sixth.

At the plate, Hayes faced Thomas, his soon-to-be UNC Greensboro teammate and roommate three times. He went 1-for-3, with a line out to right field, a strikeout (but reached on a wild pitch) and an RBI single.

Then as a reliever, Hayes’ first task was dealing with Thomas. Two wild pitches later, Thomas reached on a walk.

Reliever Chance Terry notched the victory by working two shutout innings. Blake Marsh, the first of three Post 45 pitchers in the sixth, took the loss. Those were the same pitchers of record in the first meeting, with the results reversed.