Published: December 17, 2009 11:03 pm      

Catamounts’ Brown signs in

Even for student-athletes, who often keep a schedule so busy it leaves them little time to think about what they might be missing, the freshman year of college sometimes means dealing with homesickness.

Dalton High’s Stryker Brown, however, will have a lot of familiar faces to look to next fall when he heads to Statesboro, where he’ll begin his college studies and baseball career at Georgia Southern University.

Brown will be coached by his uncle, Rodney Hennon, who has directed the Eagles to more than 350 victories in a decade leading the team. He’ll also be on the same campus as his older sister Jaimie, who will be a senior next year, and on the same team as former Catamounts standout Garren Palmer, who’s currently a freshman at Georgia Southern.

“I’ll still get to meet new people, but I’ll feel comfortable,” said Brown, a senior who gave a verbal commitment this past summer but made it official on Thursday night when he signed a partial athletic scholarship with the Eagles at Rock Bridge Community Church in downtown Dalton. “I’ve kind of been going down there now just to visit my sister. It will be nice having all of them around.”

Palmer — a starting catcher in all four of his seasons at Dalton High who was named The Daily Citizen’s All-Area Baseball Player of the Year in both his junior and senior years — signed with the NAIA’s Milligan College in December 2008, but later decided to attend Georgia Southern, an NCAA Division I program, and is on scholarship with the Eagles.

Brown is joining a program that has flourished under Hennon’s guidance. The Eagles won the Southern Conference tournament title last season, the third time they’ve done so with Hennon, himself a Dalton native and former Cats star.

“They’ve recruited really good players, have really good coaches and good facilities,” Brown said. “They’re heading in the right direction and they’re really close to getting where they want to go and where I want to go. That’s what made me want to go there.”

Brown said he’s had a few slump-busting talks with his uncle over the years, but much of what he’s learned from Hennon has been broad rather than specific knowledge, though no less important.

“He’s taught me a little bit about how to carry myself, what to do in certain situations of the game, how to act in the field,” he said. “A lot of the things that kind of get overlooked sometimes in baseball.”

He still has his senior season to play, but as a two-year starter at second base, Brown has already done a lot for Dalton, including helping make 2009 one of the program’s most successful seasons this decade. The Catamounts shook off a 3-4 start this spring to finish with a 22-6 record, were 12-0 against Sub-region 7A-4A competition and swept South Paulding in a best-of-three series for the Region 7-4A championship on their way to a third consecutive appearance in the Class 4A state playoffs.

Brown was among a large group of underclassmen who backed a solid pitching staff with good defense and he also was the leadoff man for a hard-hitting lineup. He finished with a .340 batting average and a .496 on-base percentage while collecting eight doubles, a triple, five home runs and 29 RBIs in 94 at-bats, and he also stole 11 bases and scored 33 runs.

That helped Brown — who this summer was part of Team Georgia’s championship run at the Junior Sunbelt Classic — earn his second consecutive appearance on The Daily Citizen’s All-Area Baseball Team.

“We’re glad he’ll be back,” said Dalton’s Bobby Brotherton, who has coached Brown the past two seasons. “He’s a leader for us and he makes us go.”

With one more year to make his mark at Dalton, Brown has big hopes for himself and the Cats, though he may not be returning to his spot at second base, the position he expects to play in college.

Last year’s starting shortstop, Toombs Norman, suffered a knee injury at the end of this past football season and that, coupled with the loss of eight seniors to graduation, might require shifts in the lineup and infield.

Either way, Brotherton knows Brown is a player he can count on no matter his position in the field or the lineup — and that’s a good sign for his future at Georgia Southern as well.

“He’s one of those kids that motivates himself and knows if you work hard, you look for good things to happen,” Brotherton said. “He’s gotten what he wanted and his dream’s come true to play Division I baseball.

“And he’s not going to go and sit and not work hard anymore, he’s going to go get with those even better athletes who are a lot like him and move forward and improve himself.”

Brown also recently finished his second season as the starting quarterback for Dalton’s football team, which he helped lead to a Sub-region 7A-4A title and a return to the Class 4A state playoffs after a year’s absence.

He was an honorable mention selection to The Daily Citizen’s 2008 All-Area Football Team — this year’s team won’t be published until Christmas — and chosen by coaches as a second-teamer for this season’s All-Region 7-4A squad after passing for 856 yards and 10 touchdowns while rushing for another 632 and eight to lead the Cats to a 7-4 record.

While Brown’s football days may be finished, there are lessons from that sport he’ll continue to apply on the diamond.

“It built character,” Brown said. “I learned toughness. It just taught me a lot being in that program, how to handle yourself and how things are done with class.”