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|_Thursday, March 28, 1996
Richardson to speak
at KM Hall of Fame
Former New York Yankee second baseman Bobby
Richardson will be guest speaker at the ninth annual
Kings Mountain Sports Hall of Fame ceremony
Kings Mountain
High School.
The dinner will be
held at 6:30 p.m. in
the KMHS cafeteria
and the induction
ceremony will fol-
low in B.N. Barnes
Auditorium.
Inductees include
former KMHS base-
ball coach Fred
Withers, former
KMHS football
player and coach
Bill Cashion, former
BR Mountaineer player
BOBBY RICHARDSON and college coach
Pride Ratteree, and the Second Baptist Church men's
softball team which claimed numerous championships
on the local and state scene from 1973-83.
This year's Special Achievement Award will go to
KMHS junior tennis/track star Jackie Houston.
Houston has won three straight North Carolina High
School singles titles in tennis, and also won the 400-
meter run in last spring's state track meet.
Richardson was a member of the Yankee Dynasty
which dominated the major leagues in the fifties and
early sixties. He played with such Yankee legends as
Mickey Mantle, Yogi Berra, Roger Maris and Whitey
Ford, and played under legendary manager Casey
Stengal.
Richardson played high school baseball in Sumter,
SC for Fred Withers in 1952 and '53, and helped the
Sumter American Legion team win the state champi-
onship. He signed with the Yankees right out of high
school at the age of 17, spent two years in the minor
leagues and was called up to the Yankees in the spring
of 1955.
Nine of his first 10 years in the majors, the Yankees
won the American League pennant. The only year they
were ousted in the regular season was in 1959 when
the Chicago White Sox took the A.L. flag.
The Yankees won their last A.L. pennant during that
stretch in 1964 under Yogi Berra. Richardson stayed
on until 1966 when he retired at the age of 31.
"I really wasn't old enough to retire," Richardson
said, "but I just got tired of the travel involved and I
wanted to spend more time with my family."
During his 12-year stretch with the Yankees,
Richardson compiled a lifetime batting average of
.270, and he hit over .300 twice. He was a seven-time
all-star, was MVP of the World Series in 1960 and run-
ner-up to teammate Mickey Mantle for the A.L. Most.
Valuable Player Award in 1962. To date Richardson is
the only member of a losing team to be named the
World Series MVP.
Richardson set World Series records for most runs
batted in (12 in 1960), most RBIs in a single game (6
in 1960), and most hits (13 in 1964). Richardson
played in 30 consecutive World Series games and won
five consecutive Rawlings Gold Glove Awards.
Richardson, who just turned 60 and still lives in his
hometown of Sumter with his wife, Betsy, is now re-
tired. He said he loves to travel, spoil his 12 grandchil-
dren, and speak at gatherings such as the Kings
Mountain Sports Hall of Fame.
A Baptist, Richardson is also well-known as a lay
speaker. Two of his sons, Robbie and Ron, are or-
dained Baptist ministers.
Richardson said his biggest thrill in baseball was
watching Mickey Mantle hit prodigious home runs
from both sides of the plate, and watching Roger
Maris break Babe Ruth's single season home run
record with 61 in 1961.
"And then - and I don't say this the wrong way - but
I've had both of their funerals," he said. "They were
great players and great friends of mine, and this just
points out that time is moving along."
After retiring from the Yankees, Richardson spent
several years coaching on the collegiate level. He took
over the baseball program at the University of South
Carolina in 1970, rebuilt it into a national power, and
in 1975 led the Gamecocks to a second place finish in
the College World Series in Omaha, Nebraska. The
Gamecocks compiled a 51-6 record.
"We lost to Texas in the final game of the College
World Series," he recalled. "That was a most enjoyable
experience."
During a seven-year tenure at South Carolina,
Richardson became friends with Kings Mountain na-
tive and USC assistant football coach Pride Ratteree
who was Paul Dietzel's defensive coordinator for a
number of years.
Richardson served as athletic director at Coastal
head baseball coach at athletic director at Liberty
University in Lynchburg, Va. He retired five years ago.
Richardson is still active in the Fellowship of
Christian Athletes and served for ten years as president
of Baseball Chapel. He has received many honors over
the years including two honorary doctorates, the Order
of the Palmetto from his home state of South Carolina,
and the prestigious Golden Gavel Award from
Toastmasters International.
Richardson will pull double-duty at the Hall of
Fame ceremony here. In addition to being the featured
speaker, he will also induct his high school coach,
Withers, into the Hall.
He called that a great honor.
"It's really funny," Richardson recalled, "because I
went out for the baseball team the year before Coach
Withers came to Sumter, and I was cut. Fred was good
enough to let me make the team."
Bl Tickets for the Hall of Fame banquet and induc-
tion ceremony will go on sale soon at various locations
in Kings Mountain and from members of the Hall of
Fame committee. Tickets are $10 each and include
both the 6:30 meal in the KMHS cafeteria, and the
7:30 induction ceremony in B.N. Barnes Auditorium.
Monday, April 29 at [8
HerALD SPORTS
Corey Jones builds upper body strength in KMHS weight lifting class.
Weight lifting helps improve
Most sports fans judge a team on what it does on the
field, and that's not likely to change.
But few fans - especially in the high school ranks -
don't fully realize how much hard work athletes per-
form to be prepared to play.
Today, preparing for a Friday night ball game is
much more than a week's worth of practice and a pep
talk from the coach. Indeed, most high school sports
have become a year-round activity.
Although the past football season has long been his-
tory and the next is months away, 65 KMHS gridders
as well as other athletes who participate in basketball,
baseball, soccer and other sports are involved in a
weight program which Athletic Director Ron Massey
hopes not only will improve their strength and stamina
but will also make them more confident and bring
about greater team unity.
. KMHS athletes go through a nine-week cycle where
" they lift weights and at the end of the period compile
totals in four major lifts - the bench press, squat, hang
clings and incline bench. They also do dips, vertical k
jump rope and test their times in the 40-yard dash.
KMHS has weight lifting classes for boys and girls.
Massey has designed three different clubs, or specif-
ic goals, that each athlete can achieve and they all take
pride in accomplishing those feats and seeing the re-
sults of their hard work. When they meet the require- §
ments for club membership, they are rewarded with T-
shirts.
To become a member of the Hard Rock Club, one
must have a 200-pound bench press, 250-pound squat
and 135-pound power cling.
To become a member of the Iron Mountaineer Club,
one must bench. press 250 pounds, squat 300, and have
a 165-pound power cling.
To become a member of the prestigious Ultimate
Barbarian Club, one must have a 300-pound bench
press, 400-pound squat and 225-pound power cling.
At present, only one football player, J.W. Garner,
has become a member of the Ultimate Barbarian Club
but Massey said several other athletes are very close to
joining the Charter Member. They have achieved one
or two of the requirements but are short of becoming a
full-fledged member. He expects they will be in the
club by the end of the year.
Massey records each student's results in the various
lifts and posts them on a huge board in the John
Gamble Stadium field house. Athletes are proud when
their totals are erased and replaced with higher figures.
Massey, who brought the club ideas with him from
Seventy-First High School in Fayetteville where he
was a successful football coach on the 4-A level, said
the clubs help create enthusiasm for the strength pro-
gram.
Coach Ron Massey works with football player
Emory Brown in KMHS weight lifting class.
strength, confidence, team unity
about a strength program is how much it cuts down on
injuries," he said. "An athlete can get a lot quicker and
more flexible, and the chances of becoming injured are
alot less."
Kings Mountain athletes go through a cycle where
they lift four days a week for four weeks, then go to
three days of lifting and two days of extended flexibili-
ty, plyometric training and agility drills.
In addition to becoming stronger and cutting down
i on injuries, Massey said a big asset of a well-rounded
weight program is that it builds confidence.
"You can see their confidence level improve when
they see themselves get a lot stronger,” he said.
"Mommas have to buy bigger shirts. The athletes en-
GARY
STEWART
Editor
8 improve their self-confidence a little bit."
year, Massey said he has seen tremendous improve-
ment in the strength of the athletes. W
| "I told the kids after we finished our nine-week cy-
| cle last week that it was one of the best nine-week cy-
cles I have ever had a team go through,” he said. "We
{incorporated a couple of lifts they hadn't been doing. It
took a little while for them to see their improvement
there, with hang clings especially. We just finished
breaking down the entire averages for each class, and
we've see so much of a change that our sophomore av-
would have been last year. The overall team strength
#1 for us next year is going to be a lot better."
Massey was scheduled to take some of his athletes
Sto Northwestern High in Rock Hill this week for a
#8 weight lifting meet, and later they will compete in an-
#8 other meet at West Caldwell. That's another opportuni-
ty that is new to KMHS athletes.
"I've done it in the past - at Raleigh and
Fayetteville," he said. "I try to do it about twice a year.
[ take kids that have really done well to some competi-
tion. The kids really enjoy it because it's something a
little different for them. It's a good experience to get
#some competition against some other people."
The athletes also recently competed in their own
lift-a-thon to raise funds for the KMHS athletic depart-
ment.
Coach Ron Massey encourages Joey Patrick to
lift 300 pounds, and the big Mountaineer lineman
did it.
Massey said one of the most gratifying aspects of a
good weight lifting program is that it builds unity
among athletes.
"Kids are pulling for each other," he said. "They're
pushing each other. When you work hard for some-
thing it means a little bit more to you than when you
don't." :
That kind of unity also pays off on the field, and that
keeps the fans happy.
"They get excited about how much they can im-
prove as an athlete," he said.
But a successful weight lifting program is much
more than adding strength, says the veteran coach.
"I think what a lot of people miss when they talk
Lance McClain gets encouragement from Coach Ron Massey as he successfully meets one of his goals in
weight lifting class at KMHS.
ll joy flexing in front of the mirror, and that helps them
erages came out to about what our senior classeg *
Although he has been in Kings Mountain less than all (2d
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