y Kevin Taylor

Greenville All-Star Dixie Majors coach Ed Kimbro said that it will take perfect baseball for his squad to come away with a state championship next week at the state tournament in Thomasville.

Greenville opened pool play on Friday against Prattville to determine the seeding in the tournament.

There are five teams in the tournament, but the team with the worst record in pool play will not advance to the championship bracket, said tournament director Dena LeNoir.

Chickasaw, Thomasville and AUM will join Prattville and Greenville in the tournament.

Pool play will continue with two games on Saturday and one game on Sunday. The teams then will take a day off Monday for seeding purposes with the championship bracket play kicking off on Tuesday.

Since Greenville won the district more than a week ago, Kimbro said that practices have been light.

"We've been running over everything, but these guys know what they need to do," he said. "We can't just drill them and drill them this late in the season."

A typical week of practice since winning district for Greenville was working on fundamentals and fielding. The all-stars did take in some batting practice, but Kimbro said that he wanted to give the players a chance to rest.

"This deep in the season I want to take care of them," he said. "I want their arms and legs well rested."

Although Kimbro has not been this deep in the Dixie Majors tournament, he knows what it will take to win state.

"It's going to take perfect baseball and the right mentality," he said. "If you mess up at this point, you can forget it. If we make any errors, then we'll have to make up for them. We made a few errors in the district tournament, but they didn't cost us."

Brandon Burnette was expected to draw the start against Prattville on Friday should the weather permit. Kimbro said the pitching rotation then would be up in the air after that.

"We want to get off to a strong start," Kimbro said.

The tournament in Thomasivlle isn't the only Dixie Majors state tourney going on. Alabama will have two representatives in the Dixie Majors World Series because Arkansas will not have a representative. So the winner out of the Thomasville bracket will represent south Alabama and a winner in Boaz will represent north Alabama.