It happens every June. The Major League Baseball draft has come and gone and draft hopefuls who were not selected are left disappointed.
When that happens, does the baseball dream die?
In 1977, former Charleston High pitcher Steve Brown experienced such a disappointment.
Brown was a good multi-sport athlete for the Mountain Lions in the early 1970s. He played football for Frank Vincent and was the starting quarterback in the fall of 1972. He was a sophomore on the 1970 Charleston team that beat Clarksburg Victory in the AAA state title game.
Brown was also a baseball standout at Charleston for coaches Ben Bailey and Terry Ferrell. He went on to an outstanding college career at Morris Harvey for Tom Nozica, pitching for the Golden Eagles from 1973-77, and became an all-WVIAC pitcher. He led the nation in strikeouts for small colleges and is in the Morris Harvey/University of Charleston Athletic Hall of Fame.
He was drafted in the 27th round by the Philadelphia Phillies after his junior year at Morris Harvey, but he returned to college and went undrafted after his senior season.
"I was disappointed not to get drafted after my senior year, but I decided not to give up and pursued some free-agent opportunities," remembers Brown. "I did what I could. I pitched a couple of games in an adult league in Huntington. I even threw batting practice for the AAA Charleston Charlies. I was throwing BP to guys like Tony LaRussa, Mitchell Page, Ed Ott, Tony Armas and Omar Moreno.
"Eventually I signed as a free agent with the St. Louis Cardinals. In 1977 I pitched for a Cardinals minor league team in Calgary in Canada. That was my only season of professional baseball, but at least I got a shot. "
Many area baseball players can learn from Brown's story. If you go undrafted, it does not mean you have to give up. You are only young once. While you are young, keep knocking on the door and look for independent league or free-agent opportunities. It may not result in playing in the big leagues, but at least you will know you gave it a shot.
Brown grew up in Kanawha City and played in the Charleston Southern youth league there. That area produced many players who went on to play at Charleston High, including Ralph Jean, Whitey Ferrell, Kenny Shock, Chuck Green, Butch Glover, Jeff Barnes, Bucky Lowe and others.
n Also in the early '70s, Charleston High had a good run of athletes who played quarterback for the Mountain Lions. Ricky Hurt (1968-70) won the Kennedy Award and went on to Cincinnati, Ralph Burkes (1971) was also an outstanding basketball player, Brown (1972) is a UC Hall of Famer and Danny Cook (1973) was a track athlete who went to the Naval Academy.
n It was good to catch up recently with former Nitro football standout Andy Kniceley. Kniceley, who is now a newspaper executive in the Clarksburg-Fairmont area, was one of the top linemen in the state when he played for Pat Vance at Nitro in 1977, '78 and '79.
Kniceley was a high school All-American and all-state lineman at Nitro and was named to the Charleston Daily Mail Kanawha Valley All-Decade Team for the 1970s. He played in the 1980 North-South game for South coach Leon McCoy.
Kniceley had this to say about his high school head coach Pat Vance:
"I realize it sounds like a cliché, but coach Vance was a great molder of young men. I still remember all the lessons he taught me. We had a great coaching staff at that time. Greg Cyrus was our defensive coordinator and [former Charleston Rocket] Bernie Carney was also there. Those men were great men and great coaches."
Kniceley would continue to be around good coaches. He graduated from Nitro in 1980 and went on to play for Tom Lichtenberg at Morehead State. Lichtenberg would leave Morehead State to become the offensive coordinator at Notre Dame.
Kniceley then played for Steve Loney at Morehead. Loney is now regarded as one of the best offensive line coaches in the country and has coached in the NFL for the Vikings, Cardinals, Rams and Cowboys.
Contact Frank Giardina at flg16@hotmail.com.