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Sports An’ Stuff:All-State Grid Team Probably All Wet f—By Boh Wills—Annountcmt nt of the VXA All-State football srlfrtmns forlav calls to mind an occurrence of some years n«o bearing on tin subject and, I think, quite appropriate tor retelling at this lime.At that time the Charleston l)ail\ Mail made it anannual practice to name an “All Southern West Xirgmia schoolbto team, going to considerable trouble and ex-pt nse * poll (oat In - and officials as to prefc renct tor this o returning ballots. And le. • manA HI R the TEAM ibeen fma,: drio-r; - i. ■ • Mad sp. 1 lt;a ’lt; r - %..ted S., it .-.lt;wgraciously ?lt;-nt duplicate copies of to •• that tea final m dt isthe story, along with a picture lay- based on a minority opinion out of the team, to other news- And, until the returns espoc*papers in the southern end of the i;iilv f, ,m the cat he who knowstate. n. ue than anyone ei e about theirA simultaneous release date was ,,wn blt;-vs and the flt;e M.ev faced §et for these All - S .them apps ach unarunnt) ten I! al-gtories and pictures giving the v.ays be lots of good boys leftother newspapers an equal break m the lurch.with the Mail. So jf you or your buy areAt the time our little tale took the favored by fate thisplace Virgil Stubby ' Currence UrrH, jmV in it. But if n-?. dis was sports editor of the Bluefield rrt£ard p Toe •lt;■!lt;•' ’ c -■ ms me prob* Daily Telegraph He's still with the .^ly .,11 wet anyway.paper but as managing editor now, * ------although he still writes an occasional sports column.At any rate Stubby, who has pulled some good ones in his time, had been plugging a particularly gifted Bluefield guard for all-state honors that year.But when the Daily Mail’s “All-Southern'’ story and layout reached Stubby's desk in advance he found that the Bluefield boy, whom we'll call Smith, had been completely overlooked. In his place or rather, in what Stubby thought should have been his place — a guard from Charleston, whom we’ll call Jones, had been selected.So what did Stubby do?Yes, he ran the Daily Mail’s »tory and picture layout all right . . But in every place the story mentioned “Jones of Charleston,’’ he substituted Smith of Bluefield.” and did the same with the picture layout -- taking out Jones' photo and replacing it with one of Smith. And instead of running the story on Sunday as per release date, the Daily Telegraph published It on Saturday, a full day ahead Of the other papers.YOU MAY WELL ask why theDaily Mail didn't sue Currence Welt, perhaps they could have iuccessfully. But Stubby figured they wouldn't, was right, and got a hig chuckle out of it.For both he and the publishers of the offended Mail knew all-, afate or all - southern teams weren’t that important,And that’s the point we want to make in retelling the story today,The eleven young schoolboy stars who've been named thisyear no doubt, are entirely de serving of the honor But for 'everyone of them, there areprobably five just as deriving whose name won’t be found listed 1 — perhaps not even among the ' honorable mention list.So don't be disappointed if your name, or the name of a particular j player you think deserving, is not on today's honor roll For whocan honestly say whether ’’Jones of Charleston' . a better boy than “Smith of Bluefield,And, in th . :.g run, it doesn't amount to a Kdi ■ f beans, anyway.HAVING SAT in on the year'sAll-State SeVct ,n Boa id M-v-on,I can honestly say. however, that the board docs the best it can in picking an All State team under exisiting circumstances.The big drawback is that the vo’ing is m representative enough to give a true picture of the comparative merits of the various candidates.For in • a ice. there are appmxi-m a rely ~~r' school* in West Virginia fieldir g ' otbal! teams. Yet ] c s • than 40 lt;Pies returned all-state bal; ’ O' Chairman Roy M “Legs Hawley of the selection boardThe ratio was even smaller at- a dig. 1 / ' ball officials
Newspaper Details
Beckley Post Herald and Raleigh Sunday Register
Beckley, West Virginia, US
Sun, Dec 27, 1953
Page 14
Full Page
Clipped by
Anonymous
OH, USA 07 Feb 2024
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