Tuesday, November 26, 2019

Ross Scott Set Long Time Batting Average Mark at Northwest

Ross Scott, 1945 Worth County grad, set a long-time batting average mark for a single season with .526, a record which still might stand today. He set it in the 1956 season.

He served in the US Army, being drafted twice. His first tour of duty was from 1945 to 1946, serving from December 10th, 1945 to November 20th, 1946. He was stationed in Aberdeen Proving Grounds (MD). He worked in Headquarters and played baseball and basketball.

During the Korean War, Scott was drafted again and was stationed at Camp Drake, outside of Tokyo (Japan), from September 7th, 1951 to September 5th, 1953. He worked in Classification and Assignment and played basketball and baseball. While there, his teams won the Far Eastern Championship in both basketball and baseball. Nine of the players he played with were either currently members of, or later became members of big league teams. He was credited with assigning a lot of boys from Northwest Missouri in Japan rather than Korea, including Paul Warden, Jim Ross, Don Foland, W.C. Simmons, J.B. Ross, Edgar Bunker, Chad Holmes, and others.

Following his second tour of duty, Ross Scott went to Northwest Missouri State, where he played basketball. In 1956, Northwest started up its baseball program, and he batted .526 during Northwest’s inaugural season, a mark that still stood in 1984, when Bill Gladstone wrote about it in the July 16th, 1984 Quad River News.

When he was 21, he attracted interest from the Reds; when he was 29, Scott attracted interest from the Orioles. However, he decided to enter the insurance business, where he spent his career. Fred Fussell, who pitched for the Cubs in 1922 and 1923 and the Pirates in 1928 and 1929, remains Worth County’s only major leaguer. He was born in Sheridan in 1895.

1 comment:

Danny Stevens Jr. said...

I met Ross Scott in Excelsior Springs, MO on May 28th, 2023, he was 96 years old. As of 2023, this amazing batting average baseball record still stands. Ross isn't moving quite a fast at 96 but his mind is just fine & he told me of his NWMS baseball record and his time in the military. He did mention he was drafted twice and how much he enjoyed baseball and basketball while in the U.S. Military. He's been married 69yrs to the "love of his life" Bunny. There's a good update for you all.