The team on which my son plays has recently played a team called the Tri-state Arsenal Blue out of Cherry Hill New Jersey. We were very impressed and met the founder and owner Joe Barth Jr. (Hit Doctor) who was extremely informative.

Question: Is there anyone in the state of Maryland that trains and has a track record of success in Maryland to compare to the "Hit Doctor"?

I was even more impressed that Joe takes on the weakest of the Arsenal teams himself.


Bill

Bill,

How do you mean compare? Joe Barth is a quality individual who has been around for lots of years. If you want some ideas from me, enable your private messaging on here. I would mention a name, but he may not want me putting that out on this board.

Joe's an outstanding coach who always has very good teams. The concept of taking the "weakest of the Arsenal teams" is a bit deceiving. Their program is loaded with talented players at all levels. Their success brings the better players to their program. Joe does an outstanding job of getting the most out of his players. I always enjoy seeing him at tournaments and getting to talk to him. He's a great guy. He's also a scout for (I think )the Brewers. He was very interested in Michael Dillon at a tournament we went to in Pa.

Bill,

My older son has played in the Arsenal program since he was 13 years old. Joe and his son Bob do a great job and I would recommend their program to serious players willing to do the work to go to the next level.

You should understand up front though that this is not a glorified local "all star" team, these guys take if very serious and if you sign on you better be serious about it as well.

Feel free to send me a PM if you have any questions.

Good luck.

New Jersey has a few resources to provide athletes baseball training facilities including Jack Cust’s new facility in Flemington to Joe Barth’s in Cherry Hill to Garett Teel’s Academy.

Yet when one talks about the Cherry Hill NJ area, one must mention Joe Barth Sr and of course the powerhouse of the Brooklawn American Legion. Yes, it is Joe Jr Dad!

Maryland-DC-Virginia is also as fortunate in that it has many resources across the area to provide student-athletes to help train the body, the mind and spirit on both the amateur or professonally level of play.

I also recall it was not that long ago, where the Rouse family of Columbia thought it was a good community thing to do and offer a 150,000 sq ft facility for six baseball enthusiast in the support of conducting winter baseball clinic and raising capital for their summer programs. Those six included:
- Randy, Alex, Bear, Paul, Jim & John.

Since area coaches who worked the clinic were getting as much as $100 a day from the 'fab' six, I recall receiving a call from Joe Jr offering his services and was willing to travel south. I suggested my place to crash yet finally asked, Gee Joe, why not start something is South Jersey. And he did.

The rest is history.

cheers
Bear

postscript: Larry....Demetrius says hi.
Neither I nor 'D' could remember John's last name (founding father of Reds)...(John coached the Bears in New Mexico before heading east) and son played for Lou Jenkins, and had a grand college career!

Bear...Demetrius Davis??? Excellent...what is he doing? I would like to get in touch with him, as well as his mom and dad.

John Lopez...Mr. Columbia Reds

Younger son was Brian. Older son was JP.

I can attest to Bear's account of getting Joe going. 100% correct and Joe was smart enough to get going on it!