Wither Softball?

My God, the proverbial tree in the forest toppled over, and not a person heard.  In other words, women’s pro softball all but imploded earlier this week when National Pro Fastpitch tossed out the Houston-based Scrap Yard Dawgs, the 2017 league champion, for purported rule infractions.  That’s the equivalent of MLB bouncing the World-Series champion Astros.

Clare told me about it on Monday.  Go to the NPF website, and they basically say the Scrap Yard Dawgs were forced out; go to the SYD site, and they make it clear they jumped.  But wait, there’s ever so much more.  Starting this year, three of the NPF’s five teams will exist in large part to train other countries’ athletes.

According to an online story at espnW, three teams basically will be comprised of either Chinese or Australian players; the Chicago Bandits are one of the two franchises where American college graduates will have even the faintest chance of continuing to play.  I can’t wait for President Trump to hear about this.

Playing in the U.S. to hone their skills will be very good for the Australians and Chinese, assuming the NPF season goes forward.  (The SYD sound as if they’re going to become an international barnstorming team.  Good luck with that.)  What’s wrong with this sport?  A comment in the espnW story offers a clue.

Joey Arrietta, former minority owner and general manager of the Akron Racers, noted that, “Our game is wildly successful at the collegiate level.  It just blows my mind that there is not that transfer of collegiate interest [to the NPF].”  Indeed.  Last year, something like 32,000 female athletes played college softball in the U.S., on top of 374,000 in high school.  That would seem to be a nice foundation to build on.  Or not.

For openers, Clare thinks the game is pitched to middle-school fans rather than adults like her; from the Bandits’ games I’ve attended, she may be right.  All the between-innings’ promotions and gimmicks may be fun for eighth graders, but they leave a decidedly minor-league feel to anyone interested in a serious game of softball.  (The same hold for minor-league baseball, the romance of which escapes me.)  The whole approach to the game needs to change.

Only, it may be too late for that.  In fifteen years, the league has never had more than seven teams.  Seven in a country of 300 million people, half of them female?  “At the end of the day, corporate America has to wake up to this women’s sports’ platform,” argues Arrieta.  What if it has?

What if corporate America has seen the future, and it doesn’t include professional women’s softball?  So far in American sports, women’s national teams—including basketball, ice hockey, soccer and softball—attract strong interest and the financial support that comes with it.  But try and extend that interest to pro leagues, and it pretty much disappears.  The WNBA is a poor relation of the NBA, and the other women’s sports are virtual orphans.

What do women sports’ fans want?  I don’t pretend to know, though for softball I have some ideas of my own.  The NPF has to model itself after major league baseball, with plenty of teams to insure geographic balance and a schedule of at least 100 games, if not more.  If equality between the sexes means women showing they can accomplish what men do, the closer to 162 games the better.

Softball also needs its landmarks in the way of Wrigley Field and Fenway Park, places that will give the sport a sense of tradition and permanence.  This is an architectural problem that goes back to my basic problem with softball—the dimensions are too short for players so good, especially pitchers.

In professional baseball, the stands follow the contours of the field.  The same is true in softball, with far different results because softball doesn’t have dead centerfields of 400 feet (or 300, for that matter).  Ballparks in baseball have seating for anywhere from 5,000 to 50,000 fans.  That translates into upper decks and heft, if you will.  The Chicago Bandits play in a stadium that seats all of 2,000.  We can get almost that many people into our basement, which doesn’t turn our bungalow into a mansion.  The solution?

Well, softball could change its dimensions.  Have pitchers throw from 50 feet instead of 43, and increase the length of the base paths from 60 feet to 70.  That in turn could lead to pushing the fences back; if it doesn’t, then I’d consider making the ball smaller.  Smaller balls go farther when hit, which then means a bigger field/stadium footprint.

Or maybe the NPF should just throw in the towel and tell women it’s time to play baseball.  Trust me, they have the talent to do it.  Just ask my daughter.