Poker run honors baseball coach while helping local students
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FAIRPOINT -- Engines will soon be roaring for the third annual Ray Miller Memorial Poker Run on Aug. 1.
The annual poker run was created as a way for Fairpoint Polish Club Treasurer Raymond Miller to pay tribute to his father, Ray Miller, while raising money to provide a scholarship to one student each year.
Miller said the Ray Miller Scholarship is awarded to one high school student who has excelled in sports and plans to continue an athletic career in college.
“My dad was in baseball his entire life and I grew up in baseball parks across the country. So after my dad passed away, we just wanted to do something to give out to someone just for sports, because we already have them for being smart and getting good grades. I just wanted to do something in honor of my dad’s name,” Miller said. “My dad loved to ride. He rode for years and years after he retired. I still have his Harley-Davidson trike downstairs, and I just want to do something in his name to help kids in the Valley who excel in sports.”
Ray Miller was a Major League Baseball pitching coach for the Baltimore Orioles, Minnesota Twins and Pittsburgh Pirates.
“He was in two World Series as he was with the Orioles in ’79 when the Pirates beat him and then in 1983, with the Orioles, when they beat the Philadelphia Phillies,” Miller said.
Registration for the run will be from 8:30 to 9:30 a.m., and the ride will begin at 11 a.m. from the Fairpoint Polish Club. The first stop will be Skyline Bar and Grill at Seneca Lake, followed by the Blue Moon in Barnesville, Chaps Bar and Grill in St. Clairsville and the St. Clairsville VFW before returning to the Fairpoint Polish Club.
At each stop, riders will receive a playing card. The rider with the best poker hand at the end of the run will receive a $100 gift card to Valley Harley-Davidson, while the rider with the worst hand will receive a $50 gift card.
Admission is $30 per bike and includes the ride and a meal of pulled pork, homemade macaroni and cheese, homemade coleslaw, potato salad, a pickle and cake.
Miller said the event also will feature raffles and tip boards.
He added that a new feature this year is a designated rain date on the following day.
“Hopefully this doesn’t happen, but the first two years we’ve had it, it rained. Not enough to where we couldn’t have the ride, but it rained and hindered people that probably would have come on the run,” Miller said. **”**So this year I have a rain date. If it rains too bad on Saturday, we’re going to do it the very next day on Sunday.”
He added that donations are accepted in any amount, even from people who do not participate in the ride.
Miller said this year will mark the second scholarship awarded because the event’s first year was devoted solely to raising scholarship funds. Last year, Talon Rice of St. Clairsville High School received the Ray Miller Scholarship.
Rice was the goalkeeper for the St. Clairsville High School boys soccer team and now plays for the West Liberty University men’s soccer team.
Miller said the scholarship is awarded in the winter, and the student’s parents must be members of the Fairpoint Polish Club.
“The scholarship is for if you excel in any sport, no matter what sport it is, boy or girl, and you’re going to continue your education after high school, you qualify for this scholarship that I’m giving out,” Miller said. “Their parents have to be a member of the club and then they write a paragraph or so explaining what they plan on doing with their life and why they would like to be considered for the scholarship. Then we have a small panel at the club that reviews the applications and decides who receives the scholarship.”