Maybe This Time, Contd.

Well, that didn’t take long. A month after the National Pro Fastpitch women’s softball league suspended operations in August, a new league—Women’s Professional Fastpitch—was announced a month later. Maybe things will go better this time around, but I wonder. A league press release from October said the WPF was “aiming for six to eight teams for their inaugural season,” which is slated to run from June to August. Wouldn’t it have looked better to hold off on announcing the league’s formation until franchises had been lined up? And how many games can you play in two months.? Fan interest would seem to depend on the length of schedule as well as quality of play. You can have one without the other, but the game will never catch on with fans. Right now, women’s sports in Chicago is enjoying…attention, something it’s never really had before. The Sky won the WNBA Championship last month, and the Red Stars are in Saturday’s championship game of the National Women’s Soccer League. I mean, you actually see stories where before there was nothing, and I do mean nothing. Chicago supported pro softball for as long as the NPF was around, with the Bandits usually going deep into the postseason. But softball remains the stepchild of women’s pro sports. I don’t know what will change that, outside of more games played, longer basepaths and a pitching rubber moved back a good ten feet or so. I guess will see starting next summer.