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Senior Omari Barrow is the first Pike County High School baseball player to earn a scholarship offer in at least the past decade.

Barrow recently earned his first college scholarship offer, from Payne University in Augusta, Ga.

“It made me super excited,” Barrow said of getting the offer. “I was anxious about it, wondering if I would get an offer but I decided to just trust in God and believe and pray that if I put in the work God was going to make it happen.”

Barrow is Pike County’s ace pitcher on the baseball squad and starting quarterback on the football field. He earned All-Messenger honorable mention in football in 2022 and was an All-Messenger pitcher last season, as well. On the baseball diamond, he pitched 25 and 1/3 innings and struck out 38 batters with a 4.421 ERA. At the plate, he boasted a .448 batting average with five doubles, four RBIs and 16 runs on the season.

Barrow said that he hopes his success on the diamond can help motivate some of his teammates.

“I feel like it can maybe inspire some other people here to be like, ‘It doesn’t matter where you come from.’ You can do anything you put your mind to,” he emphasized. “I want to be a leader to the fellow guys on the team, especially the freshmen and 10th graders. I want to lead by example by not just going out there and relaxing and chilling. I want to show that if you keep working, everything you want to achieve will come to you; you just have to work for it.”

Barrow is not only the first player at PCHS to earn a scholarship in at least a decade, he’s also the first player under head coach De’Andre Pitts to earn an offer, as well.

“I’m super excited for him,” Pitts said. “Coming into my first year, just trying to build a program, having a player like Omari made my job a little bit easier. He’s a true leader and he’s getting what he deserves.”

Barrow said that the player he looks up to most in baseball is Atlanta Braves star Ronald Acuna Jr. When discussing his love for baseball, Barrow’s passion for the sport is hard to miss.

“I just like the way he plays, he’s an electric player,” Barrow said of Acuna. “The game of baseball is amazing to me. I know a lot of people maybe think it’s boring but you just have to understand the game. It’s a very mental game and it’s not as physical as sports like football.
“It’s physical but you have to have a certain mindset. You could fail one day and the next day you can go out there and go 3-for-3 at the plate. There’s nothing like baseball, in my opinion.”

Barrow is a true athlete on the diamond, having played catcher, shortstop and pitcher during his career. Pitts said he hopes his senior can act as a form of motivation to his other players.

“He’s a kid that could have transferred and went to any other school in the county and played for them and would have been in their starting lineup,” Pitts emphasized. “He chose to stay in Brundidge and put his head down and work despite winning five games for three years in a row. He stayed here and put in the work and it’s paying off for him now.

“I’m super proud of him and I just hope that it encourages other kids in the program to come and trust the process and buy in just like he did and the same things can happen for them.”