Big Reds baseball teaches fundamentals at youth camp
- Frontier quarterback True King throws a pass to a wide receiver during a high school football 7-on-7 tournament Saturday at Don Drumm Stadium. (Photo by Jordan Holland)
- Marietta running back Seth Britton runs after a catch during a high school football 7-on-7 tournament Saturday at Don Drum Stadium. (Photo by Jordan Holland)
- Parkersburg High School head baseball coach Alan Burns gives instructions while setting up for a drill during the Big Reds’ annual youth camp Wednesday morning at Jackson Park. The free camp continues from 9-11 a.m. today. (Photo by Jay W. Bennett)
- Participants at the annual Parkersburg Big Reds baseball camp converge toward the infield while changing stations Wednesday morning at Jackson Park. (Photo by Jay W. Bennett)
- Parkersburg High School’s Dominic Way finished eighth place in Greco Roman at the Fargo Nationals to earn All-American honors. (Photo Provided)
- West Virginia women’s basketball head coach Mark Kellogg looks on during a practice. (Photo Provided)
- Belpre wide receiver Chase Maze runs after a catch during a high school football 7-on-7 tournament Saturday at Don Drumm Stadium. (Photo by Jordan Holland)

Parkersburg High School head baseball coach Alan Burns gives instructions while setting up for a drill during the Big Reds’ annual youth camp Wednesday morning at Jackson Park. The free camp continues from 9-11 a.m. today. (Photo by Jay W. Bennett)
VIENNA — It was good times all around here Wednesday at Jackson Park during the annual Parkersburg Big Reds youth baseball camp.
Participants from throughout the Mid-Ohio Valley converged to the three fields off Rosemar Road for the opening morning of the free two-day event.
“Williamstown, Warren, Marietta, Belpre, Mineral Wells, from all over and that’s great. That’s what we need to do,” replied PHS head baseball coach Alan Burns when asked how the area was represented aside from Parkersburg and Vienna.
Campers, who will be back at it from 9-11 a.m. today, received instructions on various aspects of the game and went through a variety of drill stations.
“They do a great job,” coach Burns said of his players. “We’ve got quite a few of the incoming freshmen that are helping here.

Participants at the annual Parkersburg Big Reds baseball camp converge toward the infield while changing stations Wednesday morning at Jackson Park. (Photo by Jay W. Bennett)
“A great group of kids and that’s what the parents always talk about after this is how good our kids are with their little ones, and they really are. That means a lot.”
Prior to the conclusion of day one, the campers made their way from fields three and two to converge on field one in center field.
Before heading out for a brief talk, Burns and his players had collected two bats, two gloves and two hats along with a yet to be claimed water bottle.
“The one that forgot three of those things, I see another parent come down here and by the time we got from field three to field one he’d left his hat at the playground,” Burns said with a smile.
“You got to love it.”
Someone definitely enjoying himself was camper Levi Spielberg, who will be in first grade at Williamstown Elementary.
He replied “yes” that he was indeed having fun and that this was his first baseball camp.
Spielberg’s partner in a toss event was “DBK” and he also was having a good time.
“I did a baseball camp at Mineral Wells,” admitted David Brantley Kimes, who will be in second grade at Blennerhassett. “I do go to ninja school.”
Burns said they had a few campers register Wednesday morning.
“We work together on that,” Burns said of Vienna Parks and the camp. “It ended up where we had a few more sign up today and I think it took us up to 106. I don’t know if they all showed up or not.
“They come back tomorrow and get a free shirt thanks to the parks department and they don’t have to pay a dime for this. I think sometimes we charge everybody for everything. Sometimes it’s good to give back to the community and not have your hand out all the time. You don’t have to charge for everything in life.”
Doing the annual event is an obvious way of giving back and Burns enjoys the interaction with the campers.
“There was a little girl out here and I said ‘did you have fun?’ And she goes ‘yeah.’ And I said ‘are you a good ballplayer?’ And she goes ‘I’ve never played ball.’ And I said ‘oh, where do you live, Vienna, Parkersburg?’ And she goes ‘Marietta.’ And I said ‘well my son lives there’ and she goes ‘we just built a house.’ And I said ‘good, where are you moving from?’ And she goes ‘Indiana. I’m just meeting people,'” Burns added.
“I had a parent of a freshman this year and she came up after the season and was talking about this camp that we have and she said ‘I want you to know, my son, when he was little he came here and he loved Landon Bryan.’ Landon was like a sophomore or a freshman and she said ‘he looked up to him so much every year he came to camp and now he’s playing with Landon Bryan.’ I thought that was so neat.”
At the conclusion of the camp, Burns added “there’s enough baseballs that all the kids get a baseball. We bring the markers and stuff and all the little kids go around and get my players’ autographs. They start running up and my kids don’t know what do expect, so that’s neat.”
Contact Jay Bennett at jbennett@newsandsentinel.com