ThomasDenton

I think I remember someone saying that last year's game was the 20th year in a row that AHS beat JSB. Not sure if that's true or not, but I'm pretty sure we haven't beaten AHS in a longer time than the VHS/JSB timespan.

Just go to Gatlinburg or Pigeon Forge, TN. Seems like every time I go there, there's a black bear strolling down the street. We even had to take shelter in a hotel once while we were walking down Gatlinburg because a bear suddenly showed up across the street. Strangely, everyone was so nonchalant about it.

Years ago, I was at my grandparents' house and we were watching a live story on the news about a bear that escaped from Bays Mountain (or some place that has bears) and after a while the area the bear was going through started looking familiar. That's when we saw my grandparents' house on the tv! The bear was walking right through the front yard as we were watching it all on the news.

That might be true about the gate and travel, but we need to play tougher schools. We should be better than we are. And besides, Abingdon doesn't even play Holston. We are about as close to a bunch of TN schools as we are any VA schools. TN High, S. East, S. Central, and S. North are all good options. They are much tougher, really close by, and I believe would bring in plenty of gate money. Besides, too many people from all the Washington Co. teams that get in games for free to be that much gate money, lol.

300+ pounds for a running back?! Dang! My brother, Jeremiah, was 6'3" and around 245 lbs. running the ball last year for Battle (of course he only played in 2 games since he broke his leg in week 2).

I think Battle made a good decision by getting J.I. Burton on their schedule, but I wish they would change a few more teams. Our district is tough and outside of the district our toughest opponents are Burton, Abingdon, and Honaker. This of course is when all these teams are up, some are down this year like Lebanon and Abingdon. But battle needs to get rid of Holston, Patrick Henry, and Twin Springs. They are all D1 schools (I know Burton is small even compared to them, but they are a powerhouse) and we need to pick up at least some D2 schools. I'd like to see Battle maybe pick up Fort Chiswell (don't know what division they are, but they seem tough), maybe at least one of the bigger Wise schools (I'd like to see Union on our schedule), or maybe some NETN teams like the Sullivan schools. I'd like to see Battle with a tough schedule all the way through. We might get our butts kicked, but we'd get better I believe.

So who did you root for in today's game between the Giants and Eagles?

Oh I can take it. My dad's a Skins fan, so I get jokes and picked on a lot, lol.

We may have problems then come gametime tomorrow. Mine's the Cowboys, lol.

Actually, I think there's some rec leagues around here that don't even have weight limits (or less strict weight limits), which is why the WCAA teams (Battle's kids) only play Bristol's kids and not the rest of Washington County or anyone else. Our weight limits are too strict compared to some others. But weight limits in high school? lol. Didn't Gate City move one of their linemen to running back a year or two ago?

I think my uncle used it to make our Denton family tree. Found out some pretty cool stuff, like how we came from Yorkshire, England (he traced it back to the 1500's), one of my ancestors was one of the first Presbyterian (I think) preachers in America and his son wrote the first English language description of the New York/New Jersey area, and later on my ancestors founded Denton's Valley in Sullivan Co., TN, and Washington Co., VA. It's all pretty interesting and addicting when you get into that stuff.

I just got on here and read this post and immediately turned the TV to SC. As soon as I did, they showed it. It wasn't much, but at least they showed it.

That is one epic looking Walmart. I might just have to go to Grundy to shop at least once (way better looking than Bristol's Walmart), lol.

Just look at Battle's case. The seniors starting now started as freshmen and every year afterwards. We're still not a super team or anything, but anyone can see that we've improved dramatically from what we were 3 or 4 years ago and part of it is the freshmen from back then getting so much experience over time. If Tazewell is going to start building like this now, it'll pay off soon enough.

Looks like they've hit 5,000.....hope it keeps going up. I'd like to see this happen too.

Powell Valley, Tennessee? lol.

http://abcnews.go.com/Sports/wireStory/report-syracuse-pittsburgh-talking-acc-14541360

If you've never seen Honaker's linemen, then you should have seen them last year. I know Tyler McReynolds (I think he graduated last year) and he was HUGE. Battle tried a couple of years ago to be cool with their entrance. Tried walking through the stands like Abingdon does, but instead of Sandman, they played that rap version of Crazy Train. There were a couple of problems though. On a few occasions, some of the players could barely walk down the concrete stairs in their cleats without almost falling and the band, which usually plays the same tune every game as the players run out of the field house and on the field, tried playing at the same time the music on the speakers was playing, so it made for an annoyingly loud and jumbled mess. We've went back to simply running out onto the field from the locker room to the band playing like before.

I actually like Maryland's uniforms. They're just so different. Most of the pro combat uniforms look awesome too. I really liked Notre Dame's throwback uniforms too (never seen them with decals on the helmets before, and I usually like seeing their green uniforms better than the blue ones). I'm a little mixed on Michigan's throwbacks though.

Sounds like a good entrance to me!

I'm impressed with Battle for the obvious reason that we're 3-0 and beat VHS, lol. Blackburn is a good, stout qb and linebacker. Rodgers has been running the ball on offense a lot and doing good, also really good on defense (think he plays corner). Rodgers and Tipton can catch just about anything (though Tipton hasn't got to play this season yet). Morefield and another kid (name escapes me) are beasts this year on defense. Heck, our offensive and defensive lines are really impressive this year. Josh Hughes and qb Ty King have been playing really good on offense as well. I'm sure I'm forgetting someone, but our whole team this season is just pretty balanced and full of good athletes.

I actually got to play JV and Varsity as a senior at Battle. The only reason is that my senior year was the very first year I ever played football and we needed more people on the JV team (which was weird because we had around 50 kids out, but we were mostly upperclassmen). Wallace Middle (Battle's feeder) has just an 8th grade team, but occasionally some 7th graders get to play up if their birthday falls on one of those weird dates, making them too old to play rec ball (my youngest brother, Jeremiah, did that).

I'm not sure who all plays basketball (haven't watched a basketball game in years). Who knows? Maybe it is winter baseball season for some, maybe not?

Just take a look at Battle's feeder schools and their records. The county teams have been pretty dominant over the years compared to the Bristol city teams and Battle's 8th grade team goes undefeated or near it every year. And the JV team was really good last year (haven't seen them play this year), but then look at the varsity team's past record. Having good youth teams doesn't necessarily mean you'll have a good Varsity team.

Yeah, I think this is one of the best coaching staffs I've ever seen at Battle. Just the way they conduct the games is more serious than what I've seen. We also have some really good athletes too and we don't just have one or two superstars, we've been spreading the ball around on offense and the defense has been backing one another up every play it seems like. Burton will be the real test. Even if we lose that game (note here that I said "if") we will still be able to measure up how good we are against the really tough teams. I think my favorite part about this season is that the coaches and players know how to adapt in games, as seen after halftime in the VHS game. That ability alone will help them out tremendously.