Published: July 29, 2009 11:31 pm         

Marty Kirkland: Bag tossing sport begins to catch on

And you thought all that time tossing bean bags was just a way to kill a few hours before your favorite college football team kicked off.

Even if you haven’t played it, if you’ve been to a tailgate in recent years, you’ve probably seen it: Cornhole, a lawn game involving tossing small, stuffed (sometimes with corn) bags at opposing wooden, sloped platforms with a single target hole. It’s fairly simple in its setup, involving a scoring system similar to horseshoes, though challenging enough to keep you from feeling like you’ve mastered the game.

Well, after spending the better part of a year playing against the same folks, Whitfield County residents Scott Adams and Gary Leming are looking to find some new competition and bring other cornhole players together. So they’re having a tournament.

Adams and Leming are the organizers for Saturday’s cornhole tourney at the Dalton Recreation Center on Civic Drive. Entry fee is $20 per two-person team and registration begins at 8:30 a.m. for the double-elimination event, which is expected to start at 9.

The tourney organizers were struck by the idea for a more formal competition while participating in a local July 4 horseshoes tourney, but they were bitten by the cornhole bug a while back.

“The first time I’d seen it was down at a tailgate for the Georgia-Florida game in Jacksonville two years ago,” Adams said. “I hadn’t even heard of it, but they play it a lot down in Florida and South Georgia and upper Tennessee.”

Hooked easily enough, Adams found the dimensions for building a standard platform online, made his own and made it a regular tailgate activity of his own. Pretty soon, that spilled over into weekend games at Adams’ home near Varnell involving a growing crowd that included Leming, a co-worker and longtime friend.

“We just started playing on Fridays and Saturdays,” Leming said. “But (Adams) has played a lot more and he’s a whole lot better than I am.”

While the regular crowd enjoys itself, Adams said the hunt for more competition is one reason he thought it was time for a tourney.

“Me and my buddies I play with, we don’t get beat much at the house,” he said. “We see the same five or six teams every weekend. I’d like to get out and see how good we really are.”

Another reason for the tourney is that Adams is optimistic the game is growing in popularity even here, where he admits it’s less common than in some other pockets of the South. This weekend should provide a good chance for area cornhole players to meet each other.

Leming and Adams have about a dozen teams tentatively lined up for Saturday, but would love to see that number climb closer to 20. The first-place prize is a set of cornhole platforms, though that will only be given if 10 teams sign in on Saturday.

If all goes well, the tourney could become a regular weekend matchup, Adams said — that would at least be long enough to get everyone ready for tailgating season.

“We’re going to go out there this weekend and, if everybody wants to do it, we’re going to do it every weekend in August,” Adams said.

If you’re interested in learning more, give Adams a call at (706) 270-3174.

n After redshirting his first year in Statesboro, Adrian Mora found his way into Georgia Southern’s starting lineup last fall. He’s found his way into some preseason honors this summer.

The former Dalton High standout kicking specialist was one of three Georgia Southern players selected by Southern Conference coaches to the preseason all-conference team — although Mora, who’s entering his sophomore season, was the only Eagle to earn first-team honors — announced this week, according to georgiasoutherneagles.com.

Mora, who picked up all-conference second team and all-freshman honors following last season, was also the Southern Conference’s first-team pick at kicker for Phil Steele’s College Football Preview.

If you knew Mora during his days as a Catamount, none of this should be too surprising.

I never had a conversation with him in which he didn’t come across as focused, determined, smart and acutely aware of his importance to the team’s success. The emphasis put on special teams at Dalton likely played a big part in helping him make that last trait stick, but he’s the one who followed through by working to make sure that was an honor rather than a burden.

Routine and rhythm seem to be crucial elements for success on special teams, particularly for kickers, and Mora seems to have settled into a nice one with the Eagles, who are preparing for their third season under coach Chris Hatcher.

Last year, as Georgia Southern went 6-5 overall and 4-4 in the conference, Mora started the final eight games, leading the team in scoring with 61 points, making 10 of 12 field goals and converting all 31 of his PATs.

Maybe even bigger numbers are in store this year for Mora.

n The next couple weeks are crucial for the Atlanta Braves. (I know that’s sort of obvious, seeing as it’s almost August and you could argue that the next couple weeks are crucial for any team actually in the race for a spot in the postseason, but humor me here.)

After their current series at Florida — which did not start well with Tuesday night’s 4-3 loss when Atlanta closer Rafael Soriano blinked for the first time in several save opportunities — finishes today, the Braves will see the Los Angeles Dodgers seven times in 10 days. That’s the same Dodgers who are neck and neck with the Yankees right now for most wins in the majors.

What should be a manageable three-game trip to San Diego is sandwiched in the Dodgers gauntlet, and a two-game blip against the awful Nationals follows, but then the division-leading Phillies — too hot to touch most of this month — head to Atlanta.

Then again, none of that may go as one would expect.

Logic says the Phillies will be a challenge for Atlanta, despite the Braves’ own good run of baseball lately. But the Braves are 7-2 against those tough Phillies, having swept them in a three-game matchup the first week of July before Philadelphia started churning out the victories.

That Nationals lineup everyone else seems to beat so easily? They’ve taken two of three from Atlanta the past two series.

But this is far from a bad time for Braves fans, who find their team actually in the conversation later in the season. Yes, there’s still a lot of baseball to play — and when you’re not in first place, who’s complaining about that? — but that would seem to be a good thing for the Braves for the first time in a while.

The hitting caught up to the pitching over the past month or so. Soriano, Tuesday’s mistake aside, is a good enough answer at closer. As August knocks at the door, there’s some real energy around the Braves.

And if everything collapses over the next couple of weeks? Well, you’ll just wait a couple of more.

When football kicks off, you’ll probably find it easier to put your Braves aggression aside until next spring.

     

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