In college baseball, 40-victory seasons are considered the gold standard. Kinnison's teams routinely win more. The story of how Kinnison, the hard-working son of a Yazoo County farmer, found his way to Delta State and eventually came back to his alma mater is one worth telling and re-telling. As you might guess, Boo Ferriss is a huge part of the story. The two form a two-man mutual admiration society. Kinnison first met Boo Ferriss when Ferriss spoke at the Benton Academy athletic banquet Kinnison's senior season. "Coach made such a strong impression, not just about baseball and sports but about life and about planning for your future. That was in 1973 and I remember thinking even then that Coach Ferriss would be a great person to play for."
But Kinnison was not college baseball material at that point. A late bloomer, he spent his first two years out of high school at Holmes Community College in Goodman, Miss., where he played football and baseball as a freshman and basketball and baseball as a sophomore. "Baseball was what I loved," Kinnison said. "I asked my coach to put in a word for me at Delta State. He said he would call Coach Ferriss." Ferriss promised Kinnison a chance to walk on and try out. "So I went to Delta State and registered and showed up for the first baseball meeting, and Coach told us we would have open tryouts," Kinnison says. "I looked around and saw about 70 guys there and that's when dawned on me that I was little bitty fish in a great big pond."
Making matters worse, Kinnison had spent the previous summer away from baseball. He needed money to pay his tuition, so he worked off-shore on an oil rig. You can't take much batting practice in the Gulf of Mexico. Kinnison was more than a little rusty when he arrived at Delta State. "Delta State was a much more advanced program than anything I had ever seen," Kinnison said. "I'll give you an example. I had never in my life hit off a pitching machine. Anybody who has ever played baseball will tell you how different that is. I don't think I impressed anybody. Coach Ferriss gave me an extended look, but I just didn't do enough."
