The Southside Freedom 9U baseball team had quite the summer in 2025 as the group finished the campaign with a record of 41-0-1.Pictured in the bottom row, from left, are Carson Jenks (with the belt), Trot Murray, Luke Townsend, Toonce Murray (bat boy) and Jarrett Eddy. Standing in the middle row, from left, are Cason Bloss, Kade Sutphin, Alex Wenmoth, Bennett Shelton, Noah Beatty and Decker Holtz. Pictured in the back, from left, are coaches Chris Murray, Chris Jenks, Reece Holtz, Robert Beatty and Chad Bloss (HC). (Photo by Sarah Murray)

PARKERSBURG — Three up, three down and it’s the end of an inning.

That’s the simplicity of baseball.

The problem with the grand old game?

It’s a very difficult sport where failure is a daily occurrence.

Although that’s inherently true on the surface, don’t bother telling the Southside Freedom 9U baseball team of skipper Chad Bloss about the difficulties of baseball.

A gang of 10 managed to put together a run for the ages this summer as Bloss’ squad, which was assisted by Chris Jenks, Reece Holtz, Robert Beatty and Chris Murray, sported a 41-0-1 mark.

“It was a Saturday morning at 8 a.m. in Elizabethtown, Ky., which is about 45 minutes south of Louisville,” recalled Bloss of missing out on a shot to go 42-0. “Sometimes on a Saturday morning you’re not on top of your game. They usually do two games on a Saturday and pool you and seed you, and you play it out on Sunday.

“It was our first game on Saturday and we were just off a little bit and we tied. They won’t let you play extra innings. There’s also a time limit on the game. We finished so many innings and ran out of time and they wouldn’t let us go on.”

As it turned out, not tasting defeat in 42 contests was a pretty good way to spend the summer.

“We have 10 kids on our team and they pretty much stay together on and off all year,” said Bloss, who watched Kade Sutphin put up team-highs in average (.663), doubles (23), triples (8), bombs (7) and runs-batted-in (72) while also going 3-0 with a save on the bump.

Technically, Sutphin was tied for the Freedom’s top triples man with Bennett Shelton, who batted .452 with 17 two-baggers, 41 RBIs and also finished with a team high five saves along with a 4-0 record.

“We play on anything from 200 to 220,” coach Bloss said of the fields. “Some of them are pretty big. Like the Sutphin boy, I mean he can hit it out about anywhere we play. He’s a big kid and he’s actually eligible to be a year below our team.

“Basically, this was their fourth year together. With that being said when we started the team you had to be a southside kid to even be eligible to play on the team. All five coaches have kids on the team and then we have five that the parents just sit and watch.”

The trio of Decker Holtz, Alex Wenmoth and Cason Bloss combined to go 27-0 on the mound with Holtz securing a team-high nine wins.

Trot Murray was second on the team in average (.638) and chipped in a quartet of saves and a trio of wins.

“We were playing the Pittsburgh Outlaws in Morgantown and we played very poorly at the beginning of the game and got down seven, eight runs,” coach Bloss replied when asked if they had any walk-offs? “I kept telling them. I said ‘stay calm, do the things you can, play your game and we’ll be fine.’ We chipped away and we’d get a couple and we get a couple more, and next thing you know we’re down one or two.

“The Sutphin boy came up and ripped a double, and then we were down one. They decided to walk a kid and ended up walking two kids in a row to load the bases with a tie ballgame and one out. Trot Murray came up and ripped a line drive to right field and we walked them off. It was amazing. It was the craziest game I’ve ever seen and it was the championship game so it had no time limit on it. We were a dead goose and they just never quit.”

Bloss said they are one of three squads in the Southside Freedom organization.

“Adam Dobson started the organization and he let me join in and start my team,” said the coach. “What I did was when they were 6 years old we got a group of kids together and called it Mineral Wells All-Stars and we played in 8-and-under baseball, and when we transitioned to 7 we whittled our roster down and we played travel 7, 8 and 9 years old all the same team.

“People stop me all the time and they say ‘do you think this will be the group (to win South’s first state title since 1975)? Do you think this will be the group?’ I just say ‘you never know.’ They are young so they might quit or go do something else. If we can keep them going they’ll have at least a chance. That’s the plan.”

The championship team celebrated their 50-year anniversary this spring at Hank Greenburg Field.

“That was my goal was to build up the southside kids for South baseball,” Bloss added while stressing “I set a pretty high expectation for people and I ask a lot of their time and we work them very, very hard, but the thing about this group of kids is they just never cease to amaze you the things they will do.

“They’ll have their back against the wall and just turn it on and they just find a way to win. It’s really enjoyable to see whenever they turn it on and start playing. They just beat about everybody. They are 41-0. They just beat everybody in their age and it’s just amazing. It’s truly amazing, especially in the sport of baseball. It doesn’t happen.”

The former 2001 Patriot grad, who started his 14-year assistant coaching career with then PSHS skipper Randy Edge and is the current director of transportation for Wood County Schools, said his boys aren’t quite done yet.

“We’ll be done here at the end of September, but we are playing three more tournaments this fall,” he said. “We played our age division all through June and then in July we played three tournaments up a year.

“They won one of those and got second in the other, and then they played up at 11U here a couple weeks ago and won it as well. They are an amazing group. It’s unbelievable.”

Contact Jay Bennett at jbennett@newsandsentinel.com

Southside Freedom 9U

Head coach: Chad Bloss

Assistants: Chris Jenks, Reece Holtz, Robert Beatty, Chris Murray

Record: 41-0-1

No., Name, Average, Games Played, 2B-3B-HR, RBIs, Pitching

1 Bennett Shelton .452 AVG, 42 GAMES – 17-8-0 (41 RBIs) – 4-0, 5 SV

3 Cason Bloss .500 AVG, 42 GAMES – 14-2-0 (43 RBIs) – 8-0

4 Jarrett Eddy .500 AVG, 38 GAMES – 2-0-0 (19 RBIs

6 Kade Sutphin .663 AVG, 42 GAMES – 23-8-7 (72 RBIs) – 3-0, 1 SV

7 Trot Murray .638 AVG, 42 GAMES – 10-5-0 (40 RBIs) – 3-0, 4 SV

8 Luke Townsend. 487 AVG, 42 GAMES – 14-3-0 (39 RBIs) – 1-0

13 Carson Jenks .477 AVG, 42 GAMES – 13-4-0 (32 RBIs) – 4-0

14 Alex Wenmoth .494 AVG, 42 GAMES – 9-6-3 (44 RBIs) – 8-0

16 Noah Beatty .483 AVG, 42 GAMES – 14-5-1 (37 RBIs)

22 Decker Holtz .481 AVG, 42 GAMES – 8-0-0 (33 RBIs) – 9-0, 1 SV