- 2022 Spotlight
Personal Statement
My name is Julie Manners and I am from Suwanee, GA (Gwinnett County). I was in the Class of 2021 at Hebron Christian Academy (HCA) in Dacula, GA. I played my freshman year of college softball (2022 season) at South Carolina State University (Class of 2025) in Orangeburg, SC and competed in the Division 1 MEAC. I am currently in the transfer portal.
I am a Marketing major at S.C. State with a 3.63 GPA. I also received the The Presidential Silver Medal for academics, allowing our team to mainintain the highest team GPA in the athletic department for a second year.
I am a 2022 MEAC Softball All-Academic Selection.
While I enjoyed my time and my team at S.C. State, I entered the transfer portal because I wanted a different collegiate softball and academic experience. A year of college softball has really reinforced for me the need to always compete and work hard both in the classroom and on the field. I appeared in 14 of my team's 40 games, and committed as a power hitting first baseman but worked hard leading up to college and in college to become a pitcher. I am very proud of the progress that I made as a pitcher and I had the lowest ERA on the S.C. State team this past season. My best pitches are my drop ball, screwball, fastball, and curve.
I hope to get the opportunity to compete at a college with a competive program and a strong business school that will allow me to study Marketing or Entrepreneurship.
I spent the first three semesters of high school at North Gwinnett HS, my local school. North Gwinnett is a great school that's also very large. I played my first two seasons of high school ball at North Gwinnett and did very well. I was a starter on the 9th grade and JV teams and was scheduled to compete for a starting spot as a junior.
However, I transferred to HCA in January 2019 purely for academic reasons. HCA is about 15% of the size of North Gwinnett and the smaller class sizes and school atmosphere are a perfect fit for me.
My goal is to play college softball at a school where I can pursue my goal of studying business or entrepreneurship. I am open to schools of all sizes. For travel ball I play for the 18U Georgia Classics based in Jefferson, GA. For 16U travel ball, I played for Georgia Legacy in Snellville, GA. However my 16U team did not move up to 18U.
I am a first baseman and a right handed pitcher. I have two primary pitches, a fastball, change up, and I am working on a riseball that is now ready for me to use in a game. I am a power hitter who hits line drives and I typically bat 4 or 5 in our lineup, but I rarely strikeout. I can hit behind the runner and I can bunt.
https://www.gwinnettprepsports.com/sports/local-pair-selected-for-mlb-softball-developmental-camp/article_c547ddda-7dd4-5c3a-a32a-41df914ea2a9.html
I was one of only two Georgia athletes invited to attend the 2019 Elite Development Invitational camp at the Jackie Robinson Training Complex in Vero Beach, Florida. The camp was for 90 amateur softball players and is sponsored by Major League Baseball and USA Softball. I look forward to learning from and working with current and former USA Softball Olympians for a week .
in July 2019 my Atlanta Braves RBI team finished second in the MLB RBI Regional Tournament. I won the Regional Home Run Derby by hitting five home runs in two minutes. In 2021 I was one of the leaders on the Atlanta Braves RBI team that advanced to the national World Series where we lost to Houston. I drove in the winning run with two outs and bases loaded to advance my team past Tampa.
My career goal is to be an entrepreneur, and I am looking for a school that will help me achieve this goal. My mother is an attorney/teacher and my dad is a corporate tax partner in public accounting. I have a goal to study business and to launch my own product line. I would like a university with a strong business program, ideally with an entrepreneurship track.
