“What I want to be when I grow up is to be a pro,” said Cornville resident Noah Decker, 9, about his cornhole aspirations ahead of competing in the American Cornhole League’s 2025 World Championships.
Decker will need all the practice time he can get ahead of his full competition schedule this summer, since he’ll be competing in the Arizona State Cornhole Championships, Friday, July 18, through Sunday, July 20, at Harrah’s Ak-Chin Event Center in Maricopa, followed by the American Cornhole World Championships in Rock Hill, S.C., which runs July 28 through Aug. 3. Decker will also be competing at the regional tournament.
The Cottonwood Community School student, who cites math as his favorite subject, has been playing the game since he was 2 years old and began competing seriously two years ago.
“[Noah] is a kind, silly, typical boy who loves to be outside and play [and] he always wants to help people and make people feel good,” his mother Ashley Decker said. “Now he’s in competitive [cornhole] and he just loves it … He plays all day long, he wakes up in the morning, he goes outside and he’s throwing bags. If he has any free time at all, that’s what he’s doing.”
His packed summer schedule comes on the heels of a standout performance earlier this month.
Decker said he also held a cornhole tournament to celebrate his 9th birthday — which he also won. During the celebration, he received new headphones for cornhole, a wallet, money and a new water gun. He plans to use the headphones to listen to country music and Taylor Swift, whom he cited as among his favorite artists.
“We’ve always done a birthday cornhole tournament for him,” Ashely Decker said. “We started playing locally in different cornhole tournaments. Then we decided to go up and try one of the ACL tournaments, and Noah loved it. After he took first in the intermediate bracket, we got an email saying they moved him up another division.”
Decker’s favorite professional player is Mark Richards of the American Cornhole League, and he cited his favorite technique is to throw the bags so that they roll into the hole. The 9-year-old described his throwing style as doing a “butterfly throw” and then flipping the bag upon release. He offered succinct advice for beginners to get better in the sport: “Practice every day.”
While Decker has lined up a bag sponsor he has also been hosting cornhole tournaments and doing other fundraising to get him to competitions, complete with hand written notes to those that contribute.
His next fundraiser is on Saturday, July 12, starting at 11 a.m. the Old Corral Bar located at 11375 East Cornville Road in Cornville is hosting a cornhole tournament fundraiser to help raise funds to get Decker to his competitions. The tentative format is a double tournament with a blind draw where players get randomly assigned their partner, the anticipated registration cost is $10 a player.
For more information visit oldcorralbar.com or Facebook at “theoldcorralbar” and Decker anticipates adding the event into the cornhole app “Scoreholio.”
