It was a big week for the Demopolis High School baseball team and few players came up bigger than senior Scott Cannon. While their area championship victory over Greenville Thursday night was the epitome of a team effort, it was Cannon who came in from right to take over the pitching duties once starter Rob Rorie had reached his pitch limit. With one out in the fifth and a two-run lead, Cannon was charged with sealing the deal for DHS.

After hitting a rough patch in the fifth, the senior made the pitch he had to make to get out of the inning. However, an errant throw allowed two runs to score, tying the game. Undaunted, Cannon toed the rubber in the sixth with a three-run lead thanks to a fifth inning, two-out rally by the Tigers.

Cannon was not as dominant as he would like to be as he is admittedly not back to full strength following the rotator cuff surgery that took its toll on his fastball. But the senior battled, bowed his neck, climbed the ladder and embodied all of head coach Ben Ramer&8217;s sayings which have become mantras for Tiger baseball.

That fact evidenced itself in the sixth inning when Cannon retired the first two batter he saw before a two-out single, an infield hit and a stolen base allowed Greenville to bring the potential tying run to the plate with two men in scoring position. After falling behind in the count, Cannon dug deep, looked inside and found enough to come up with the only Demopolis strikeout of the night, ending the inning and the Greenville scoring threat.

He then returned to pitch the seventh, holding the visiting team at bay one final time to pick up the win in his first pitching appearance in front of the home crowd all season long.

His was a performance which served as a kind of microcosm of the Demopolis season, displaying a grittiness and fortitude worthy of Player of the Week honors.