Johnsonville pitcher‘s one-armed no-hitter making national news

His video on youtube has almost 100,000 hits, and his story has been featured recently on national outlets such as Newsday, Huffingtonpost.com and NBC Sports.

Meet Coleman Shannon, the 14-year-old pitcher from Johnsonville whose feel-good story is making national news.

Shannon, who has only a partial right arm, pitched a no-hitter during a recent youth-league baseball game. Reporter Matt McColl of The Weekly Observer and scnow.com, in the Pee Dee region of the state, wrote a feature about Shannon, and word spread from there.

Shannon was born with a medical condition known as Amelia, in which a person lacks one or more limbs. But that certainly has not slowed him down. Shannon threw away his prosthetic arm when he was two years old, and also hunts and plays guitar.

“With Coleman, it's determination and something that he strives to do,” his mother, Jessica, told scnow.com. “It's a feeling that as a parent, you really can't describe it.”

Shannon pitched his seven-inning no-hitter against a team from Timmonsville on April 24. He tucks his glove under his right elbow while pitching with his left hand, much like former MLB star Jim Abbott, who threw a no-hitter for the New York Yankees in 1993.

“I've got a bunch of people to back me up,” Shannon said. “And that's the way the game is supposed to be played.”