the SCOUTING REPORT
Glimpse Of The Future
I took time out of a busy day to get my wife out of the house and take in a football game last Thursday afternoon at J.R. Trippe. We took one of my University of Georgia fold-up chairs, and Barbara sat in the endzone while I took some pics. I will post them online, on my Facebook and Twitter accounts.
I work at Plant Hatch, and we’d taken most of Tuesday and Wednesday for one of our quarterly trips to Emory University Hospital’s Winship Cancer Center in Atlanta for one of Barbara’s appointments with some of the best medical experts in the world.
We have been so blessed to have had great treatment here at the cancer center at Meadows; but we’ve also walked the halls where diseases like Ebola have been treated and where the Center for Disease Control is basically right next door.
With the pandemic going on, Barbara stays at home most of the time. I wanted to see Trippe play. Getting her outside in that kind of environment was exactly what she needed.
As I watched the game, I thought about some of the kids who have come through this program. We’ve seen running backs like Juan Foster and Tra Hardy, quarterbacks like Jordan Black and Josh Sasser, and linebackers like Nate and Nick McBride, Josh Harrell, and Nyshun Bell.
Those are All-State names in Georgia. I’m sure there are more in Trippe’s future, especially after seeing them play.
This year’s team is small; but quick. Running back A.J. McClendon reminds me a lot of Juan Foster, tough and incredibly quick.
A small but gutty QB, Jackson Berry, is a very good passer. He hit a beautiful TD pass on the last play of the half to receiver Lyric McKinney, who is only a 7th grader.
After beating Jeff Davis, Trippe is 7-0, and they’ll be matched in the Middle continued from page
Georgia Middle School Athletic Association’s Championship Game against the winner of the Bleckley County-Swainsboro game.
Memories Of 1955
Whoever came up with the decision to present Travis McBride’s varsity football jacket to the McBride family in a frame last Friday night should have a big pat on the back. What a great idea! The black jacket with white sleeves, a gold ‘V’, and a gold patch on the chest reading “1955 South Georgia Champions” is absolutely beautiful. That jacket and patch really stoked my memory.
That was a great Vidalia team, which finished 12-1 and lost in the state final to Morgan County on what my father and mother called the coldest nights of their lives.
The championship game was played in Sandersville, a neutral site sort of halfway between Morgan County and Vidalia. I think the cold gave the Northern school an advantage that season.
That team featured James Brantley, who was undoubtedly one of the best athletes ever to compete in football or track and field at Vidalia. When the late Ralph Parsons tells you “he was the greatest athlete he ever coached,” that’s pretty impressive. Coach Frank Fabris was at Vidalia for two seasons. His first team was 10-2. His second team at Vidalia was the one that played for the state title. Fabris went on to become the head coach at Rossville, where he won a state championship with a 13-0 record in Class AA in 1962. He went 9-1 in 1963 and then got into college coaching at Brigham Young University, where he got his Master's degree. He later coached at Vanderbilt and Mississippi State.
Coach Fabris went on to become the Assistant Director of Continuing Education at the University of Georgia. On one of my trips to Athens with my dad, we stopped by to see Coach Fabris at his office.
I asked him about Vidalia’s uniforms at that time, which were not in the school’s “Black and Gold” colors. He told me that a dealer had them, and that he had thought that they looked so good and the price was so right that he couldn’t pass them up. So the 1955 Indians, whose colors were Black and Gold, wore the powder blue jerseys, old gold pants, and gold helmets that UCLA wore at that time. And by the way, on a personal note, I will always miss seeing Travis and Hilda Mc- Bride at Vidalia games.
