<span style='font-size:14pt;line-height:100%'>Ex-USM stars stepped off mound, into suburbia</span>

Chad Rogers and former Courtney Blades enjoying family life in Georgia

By Tim Doherty
tdoherty@clarionledger.com

Courtney Rogers doesn't miss the former Courtney Blades all that much, instead preferring the roles of wife, mother and preschool teacher to All-American pitcher.

Chad Rogers has funneled all the intensity he once took to the pitching mound at Taylor Park into a rapidly rising managerial career with Sherwin-Williams Company.

The former Southern Miss standouts in softball and baseball, respectively, have settled into the Atlanta suburb of Sugar Hill, where they are raising a 2-year-old daughter and will be welcoming a son in another three months or so.

"I don't know if we'll have pitchers or not," said Chad Rogers, who was an All-Conference USA selection as junior in 2000 and still ranks among USM's Top 10 with a career 3.07 ERA.

"We've been moving around some, but we really like it here."

The trail started in Hattiesburg, where the two first met in 2000 at his birthday party. It has included a one-year stop in Athens, Ga., for Courtney Rogers, who did a one-year stint as an assistant coach at the University of Georgia under former USM head coach Lu Harris.

Then it was on to Nashville, Gainesville, Ga., Jefferson, Ga., and finally, Sugar Hill as Chad Rogers rose from an assistant manager to running the third-largest of Sherwin-Williams' 63 stores in Atlanta.

The couple were married in August 2001. The following June, Britton Lane Rogers made her debut.

"She's two but she thinks she's about five," said Courtney Rogers, the 2000 Honda Award winner as college softball's player of the year.

"She's very independent, wants to do everything by herself."

She comes by it honestly.

Her mom was one-man wrecking crew in the pitching circle, a two-time All-American who held NCAA records for most wins (52) and strikeouts (663) in a season and career (151, 1,773), while carrying the Lady Eagles to a pair of NCAA Regional championships and two Women's College World Series appearances.

She became the first pitcher to throw a complete perfect game in the World Series, shutting down third-ranked Arizona 1-0 in 2000.

Chad Rogers was a left-hander's personality in a right-hander's body, using his wiles and a deft change-up to baffle batters. If USM lost, it was because he didn't do enough. If the Golden Eagles won, it was because his teammates made it easy for him.

He once felt so despondent about being pulled from a ballgame, he left the park, hopped in his car and drove to his mother's home in Pensacola, Fla., to contemplate his performance.

"I'm still competitive, it's just that it's at work now," said Rogers, who also keeps his mitt in the game these days as part of a slow-pitch softball team.

<a href='http://www.clarionledger.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20040802/SPORTS/408020344/1097/SPORTS030104' target='_blank'>CLARION-LEDGER: Whatever happened to Rogers/Blades?</a>