A broken thumb kept Grant Cordell from going behind the plate but did little to keep the senior from performing at the plate.
Despite the fracture, suffered 10 days ago in a preseason scrimmage, Cordell stroked a pair of doubles and knocked in four runs as Soddy-Daisy opened its rain-delayed Tennessee high school baseball season with a six-inning, 12-2 District 5-AAA victory over visiting East Hamilton.
The game was a matchup of 2015 state tournament attendees but was not reminiscent of the teams’ series of epic battles last year in reaching the Spring Fling.
“We didn’t resemble the state tournament team of 2015,” East Hamilton coach Steve Garland said. “Soddy-Daisy was more aggressive than us, more athletic than us. They competed. We didn’t look like we were ready to go, and that’s on me. This is just the beginning. We’ll be better.”
What the Hurricanes found lacking from 2015, Soddy-Daisy seems to have carried over.