Bryce Harper ready for JUCO World Series

College of Southern Nevada baseball coach Tim Chambers is preparing the Coyotes for their first trip to the JUCO World Series since 2003, which begins Saturday and runs through June 5 in Grand Junction, Colorado. To follow the tournament, including play-by-play and schedules, click JUCO World Series to stay up-to-date on Bryce's exploits. This could turn out to be the biggest nine days so far in Bryce's baseball life. Seven days in the JUCO World Series in Grand Junction, then two days after that, Bryce is expected to be the number one overall selection by the Washington Nationals in the Amateur Draft. After last week's performance by 17-year old phenom Bryce Harper, I asked Tim if it was the most amazing few games Bryce had played in all season? "Everything he has done this year is one of the more amazing things that I have seen. He had two six-hit games. Four homers in a game. I think he had 20 RBIs in the weekend, 10 in one game. He has shattered every school record, everything but stolen bases. "I swear to you if we swung aluminum like everyone else in the country he would have hit 50 homers (on the season). "We hit 76 homers as a team this year. We hit 17 total last year." Tim feels this year's team is better than the 2003 team he took all the way to the national title. College of Southern Nevada opens against #4 Pitt Community College out of Winterville, North Carolina. "We have already pulled all of their numbers, we look at the matchups; left vs. right, right vs. left." But the best scouting comes from his best player. Bryce helped his coach this week prepare for Pitt CC because he played against them two or three times while he was with Team USA during the fall baseball trials in North Carolina. Bryce told us about their real good left-hander and their top offensive bats. "We have high expectations of our team. We want them to stay focused. For Bryce to do what he did with all the attention, pressure and that label on him all year, is pretty impressive. "The team was calm and collected after winning in Lamar last weekend. They just shook hands after districts, and go out about their business." Chambers knows that the JUCO World Series is a brand new test. "This is going to be a whole new animal. 15,000 fans expected per game. Most of them have played only in front of 5,000." It is a seven day tournament. Saturday to Saturday. There are no doubleheaders. If the Coyotes win Saturday, they will play again on Monday. I could help but go back to the 500-foot homer that Bryce Harper hit last week at the Western District Championships in southeastern Colorado. Tim, do you think it was a 500-foot homer by Bryce last week in Lamar? "That is what we were guessing, Even more impressive was that It was an opposite field homer. "There were six or seven old-timers sitting by our dugout between the cages and they just started laughing and told me that was the longest home run they had ever seen hit at Lamar by a long ways. Lamar's coach was also sitting in the stands during the game and remarked, "I guess we won't be pitching to that guy." Chambers says more teams do not walk Bryce because their lineup from top to bottom is stacked. If you walk Bryce, there are home run hitters behind him. "One thing people don't realize about Bryce is that he knows he is going to be pitched around. He has seen so many off speed pitches this year. He has become a real good off-speed hitter. If he can touch it, he is going swing at it. He has hit some of his home runs and some of his hits on balls that are way out of the zone. If you look at the stats analysis, he is was at one time over 100 points better against left handers than right handers. Right now it is pretty even, .433 against lefties and .445 against righties."