It was a familiar scene as Marked Tree's Richie Tate, playing for the Northwest team, watched the pitch of EPC's Chris Maddox of the Northeast team during their game Monday in the XtraInnings Classic at the ASU baseball complex. (Tribune photo/Dan Brawner)

For the fifth year in a row the XtraInnings Classic got underway Sunday in Jonesboro, first at Nettleton Stadium, and then at ASU's baseball complex. As always, the best underclass baseball players in the state were in attendance, playing for one of four teams from the four corners of Arkansas.

One difference this year from years past was that the Northeast team had two players from the Tri-cities area, while the Northwest team had an alternate also from the Tri-cities area. Senior Carson Tyler and junior Chris Maddox, both of EPC, were the two players selected to play on the Northeast team. Junior Richie Tate, named an alternate from the Northeast, played for the Northwest team when they came up a player short just a few days before the Classic began.

Another first was that EPC head baseball coach Brian Weathers was chosen as an assistant coach on the Northeast team.

"This is really the only event of its kind for underclassmen in Arkansas," said Weathers. "The top five or six players from each conference were chosen by the coaches of the conferences. Then in those names are sent to the XtraInnings staff and the teams are chosen from there."

Some 100 players, which were on the original Northeast Arkansas list and had to be pared down to just 22 players. A similar process was gone through for each of the other three teams in the state is well.

Maddox and Tyler were chosen as the number one and number two players in the 3A-3 Conference. Tate was chosen as the number one player in the 2A-3 Conference.

"I was tickled to death for Richie," said Tate's coach, Matt Wright, who was in attendance to see his player Monday. "It's great for all three of them. Chris and Carson deserve to be here."

While there are a number of baseball classics played in Arkansas each year, two things make the XtraInnings Classic special. First, while each of the players is the best in their region and by default play to the best of their ability and to win at all times, whether any team wins or loses a game in the round-robin format, is not particularly important. In fact, the game between the Northeast and Southeast teams Sunday afternoon ended in a 7-7 tie. That of course would be sacrilege for a baseball purist, but the key thing here is to showcase the talent each player has.

The reason for this, is the second thing that makes the XtraInnings Classic special. At the games as well as at the Pro Day, which precedes the games, both professional and college scouts from all over the country are in attendance to see just what the state has to offer.

"There were probably 30 or 40 of them (scouts) here for the Pro Day on Sunday," said Weathers. "They tested them in all kinds of things including the 60 yard dash, as well as their hitting, fielding and pitching speeds."

Just some of the schools and professional teams represented were the University of Arkansas, the University of Memphis, the San Francisco Giants, the White Sox, the Cardinals, Arkansas State, of course, as well as a number of junior colleges and independent scouts, who freelance for teams and schools. Needless to say, it was somewhat nerve-racking for the players knowing they were being scrutinized so closely by so many scouts, while at the same time trying so hard to impress them.

"It was uncomfortable, but it was fun," said Tyler. "We didn't know what to expect."

"There were a bunch of them," added Maddox before the games began on Monday. "I just tried to forget about them and pitch."

In the two games played Sunday afternoon, each team had to the change their pitcher at the end of each inning in the two 10 inning games. As a result, the scouts were able to look at as many pitchers as possible from each of the four teams.

Pitching, of course, was at the top of the list of what the scouts were looking for as was evidenced by the fact that each of the teams had about 10 pitchers out of the 22 players.

Tate also pitched Monday, and impressed a couple of scouts when his pitches were clocked at around 85 mph. Plus, in his one inning of pitching, he registered a strikeout, a groundout and a pop-up.

While the players were the best around, the coaches, according to Weathers, were just randomly picked. Not that these coaches didn't have winning teams, which they did, but with players of this caliber, the job is more managing than coaching..

"At this level there's not much coaching to be done." said the coach. "They all know what to do and they do it. Everyone is good in every phase of the game. And it's kind of tough on the pitchers because there's not an easy out in any of the line-ups."

Another thing which impressed the three Tri-City players was playing on the ASU field. Even though it's not considered to be a top level field, even in the Sun Belt Conference, it is still considerably above virtually every high school field around and that most of these kids have played on..

"It's a lot of fun playing on a D-I field," each of the players echoed.

After the final game ended Monday night, Maddox, Tate and Tyler, no doubt, had an abundance of experiences to relate to their teammates on into next season and beyond. And if any of them impressed any of the scouts enough, in the next few days or weeks or months later, they or their coach will get a call or letter to that effect. And then things will really get excited.

But, even if none of the three ever get that call or that letter, or ever set foot on a college or professional baseball diamond for the rest of their lives (an unlikely eventuality) they will have benefited from being a part of the 2008 XtraInnings Classic