By Mike London
mike.london@salisburypost.com

SALISBURY — It’s 93 degrees, and that torrid temperature is accompanied by awful humidity on a sweltering Friday afternoon.

But Rowan County American Legion players seem to be enjoying the grind of baseball. They’re toiling diligently in the cages and in the outfield at Newman Park, with soaking wet T-shirts but without complaints.

Baseball is more fun than work, especially when you’ve just put a 30-3 regular season in the record books.

Assistant coach Seth Graham methodically operates a pitching machine, and those automated offerings are met with crisp line drives that sail to all corners of the renovated ball park. Head coach Jim Gantt watches each swing intently from his position near the home dugout.

Morgan Padgett is out in right field, but Gantt calls in the tall, lean first baseman to serve as a spokesman for the team’s efforts up to this point.

“Padgett has been really good for us in so many ways,” Gantt said. “I didn’t know a lot about him about him before this summer. Just knew he had a very good senior season pitching and hitting for East Rowan. The big surprise for me has been how well he can play first base. He’s very long and he can stretch horizontally as well as vertically to take throws. He is aware of every situation that can happen on the field. He’s a really smart baseball player, really understands how to play first base.”

While Padgett is a mature, 17-year-old high school graduate who will head to UNC Pembroke to continue his career and education in mid-August, he is a rookie as far as American Legion baseball.

He always has played travel baseball in the summers for the South Charlotte Panthers, the area’s top showcase organization. Exposure to college coaches while playing for the Panthers got him recruited by UNCP, so he’s grateful for that, but Legion has been a wonderful new experience for one of Rowan’s most intense competitors.

“I knew I needed to play summer ball and Rowan Legion was right down the road with a Division II coach (Gantt), a lot of my East teammates  and a lot of guys I knew from the other teams,” Padgett said. “I do like Legion a lot because you play a game almost every day. You get to grind every single day. I like to compete, and all the guys on this team are very competitive and really into baseball. They’re all about winning. That’s made it a fun summer.

Rowan County has quite a few position players who pitch some innings. They also have some pitchers who can play a position when needed.

But Padgett and left fielder/ace pitcher Hayden Simmerson are a little different. They qualify as true two-way players. They’re in the lineup every game while also taking a regular turn in the pitching rotation.

“It’s fun to be able to contribute with the bat, but I really do enjoy competing as a pitcher,” Padgett said. “You’ve got the ball in your hands, and it’s up to you to throw strikes and allow your team to have a chance to win. When I’m at the plate, I’m just trying to put balls in play and drive runs in. I’m in a good place in the lineup (cleanup), hitting behind JT Taylor, Blake Hill and Luke Graham. Those guys are on base all the time.”

A big part of the fun of Legion ball is watching guys from West Rowan, East Rowan and Carson come together every summer. They are fierce rivals during the high school season. Sometimes it may take a week or two for it to happen, but at some point they start thinking about former enemies as teammates.

“They’re all good guys,” Padgett said. “We get along.”

Ask Padgett to name his best game, and he struggles with that. There’s a reason. He’s not overly concerned with stats.

“I just show up and play,” he said. “I have no idea what my best game was. I just try to win.”

He admits he got off to a dismal start this summer.

He does know where it turned around for him. The turning point came when Rowan County played four games in three days in Shelby.

Rowan trailed Wayne County, always one of the state’s top teams, 3-1, when Padgett hit a two-run homer in the fourth inning to tie it. That was the key swing in a 7-4 Rowan victory and he also was credited with the pitching win. That’s when he got rolling.

“Had a really slow start because my timing just got off,” Padgett said. “But I started to get it back in Shelby.”

He has stayed hot for almost a month. He’s now batting .425 with eight doubles. He’s tied for second on the team in RBIs with 29.

“We kept him in the middle of the lineup even when he was struggling because of the way he hit in the high school season,” Gantt said. “Patience paid off. Right now, he’s one of the guys we want to see coming to the plate. He barrels a lot of balls. As he gets older and grows into his body, he’s going to hit with some serious power.”

Taylor, Rowan’s shortstop, is having an epic season with a .442 batting average, 45 runs, 45 RBIs, 12 doubles, three triples and eight home runs.

Graham, the third baseman, is batting .438 with a team-leading 46 base hits.

Hill, the right fielder, is batting .363 with 10 doubles, four triples and 29 RBIs.

Simmerson, who plays left field when he’s not pitching, is hitting .351 with three homers, 11 doubles and 24 RBIs.

DH/left fielder Aiden Schenck has four homers. Second baseman Cole Johnson has come back from a broken nose to bat .369.

Center fielders Elijah Palmer and Emory Taylor and catchers Matthew Connolly and Cameron Burleyson have gotten on base at a solid rate at the bottom of the lineup and have provided excellent defense.

On the mound, Padgett (3-1) has given up quite a few hits per innings pitched, but he limits walks — just four all summer — and that helps him limit runs.

He had one weird relief outing at Davidson County, allowing six hits in one inning, but he bounced right back from it to pitch five shutout innings against a good Kannapolis team, as Rowan clinched the division title — the 40th division championship for a storied program.

“That game against Davidson, I threw too many inside fastballs, and they were hitting them,” Padgett said. “And I was bouncing changeups, so I couldn’t get them to swing at them.”

Padgett was the leading winner among Rowan pitchers during the high school season with eight victories against only one loss, so he’s got a lot of confidence when he takes the mound. One bad game wasn’t going to shake his belief in himself.

“He’s not going to blow it by people, but he’s really good at reading swings,” Gantt said. “He knows how he needs to pitch every hitter.”

Another facet of the game that Padgett takes pride in is baserunning.

“Besides being one of our most impressive hitters, he’s fun to watch on the base paths,” assistant coach Lee Poteat said. “He’s not that fast, but he has a lot of knowledge and rarely makes a mistake. He’s always looking to take that extra base, and he does good job of reading throws and knowing when he can move up.”

The playoffs start on Sunday at 7 p.m. at Newman Park.

Gantt expects Rowan County to play the Foothills team based in Surry County in a best-of-three series. Foothills and Chatham County tied for third in the Northern Division, but Chatham got third place based on run differential. So Chatham will be playing Southern Division runner-up Kannapolis in the first round.

Gantt knows better than anyone that you can’t assume anything in Legion baseball, but Rowan County will be expected to win its first-round series.

Things may get serious in the second round. Randolph County is the likely opponent, as Randolph only finished second in the Northern Division. High Point finished first by beating Randolph County twice, although Randolph wasn’t at full strength for either of those games,

It’s possible that Rowan and Randolph are the two best teams in the state, but one of them is going to be done very early.

Rowan County would need to be sharp to beat a Randolph team that handed Rowan two of its three losses.

But Rowan’s players are no stranger to challenges. That’s why they signed up — to play for outstanding coaches and to play against the best competition in the area.

“We’ve got a good team that can go a long way,” Padgett said. “We’ll be ready to compete no matter who we play.”