Baseball Tries to Copy Softball’s Pitch for the Olympics

During the past few months, we have been following the ISF’s efforts to get men’s fastpitch added as an Olympic sport, as part of the larger effort (“Backsoftball.org“) to reinstate women’s softball. Women’s softball, of course, was an Olympic sport from 1996 through 2008.

A similar campaign has been made for the reinstatement of (men’s) baseball to the Olympics., though baseball appears to be beset by a different set of problems, most notably those involving steriods and the heavy emphasis of the IOC on controlling doping issues.

The ISF’s Don Porter divorced the efforts for reinstatement of women’s softball from those of baseball. Press releases have emphasized the lack of drug problems in women’s softball, as implicitly contrasted with those of baseball.

The baseball folks tried to get Porter and the ISF to reconsider, and join them in a joint bid for women’s softball and men’s baseball, which had both been Olympic sports through the 2008 Olympiad. Those efforts by the baseball proponents included enlisting the help of well known and highly regarded Harvey Schiller, president of the International Baseball Federation, but Porter and the ISF resisted the advances, instead offering up a proposal which would add men’s softball along with reinstatement of women’s softball.

The “Backsoftball” press releases tout the fact that Japan won gold in 2008 (implicitly underscoring that teams other than the USA win/can win). A New York Times article came right out and said it: “U.S. Dominance Caused Softball’s Olympic Demise”

I don’t profess to know all of the politics involved, or the behind the scenes machinations, but it does seem to me that doping is a huge issue for the Olympics, and baseball’s image in that regard is less than stellar. Accordingly, the decision of softball to “go it alone”, separate from baseball certainly makes some sense. It also seems clear to me that the softball efforts are taking into account world politics which might impact the voting later this year, by emphasizing the fact that a team other than the U.S. won gold, and the fact that women’s softball is growing in popularity in Middle Eastern countries.

Noted in the “Back Softball” press release:

“In particular, we are looking to increase the number of young people playing Softball across the world as well as help more women and girls play sport across the Middle East and other similar societies. That is why we welcomed the recent application from Jordan to set up a national federation. This will be the first of many new Softball federations in the Middle East.”

Whether one likes or agrees with that approach, it seems clear that the softball proponents are trying to pitch every aspect of the possible reinstatement of softball to the Olympics. Though I disdain the idea of mixing sport and politics, when it comes to the Olympics, the two are undeniably intertwined.

As we wrote in an earlier post, the decision making body has stepped up the schedule for the decision, announcing that they will choose two of the seven sports at their August committee meetings, with those two to be presented to the IOC in October.

Things took a bit of a strange twist this week, when the baseball proponents attempted to copy a page from Don Porter’s playbook, though in my estimation, in less than convincing fashion, offering up women’s baseball to go with men’s baseball. The two camps, i.e. softball and baseball issued competing press releases, with baseball touting the idea of women’s baseball, while Don Porter and the softball folks posed the question framed here: “women’s baseball?”.

That was certainly my reaction as well. I was not aware of any women’s baseball leagues or competition of a level that would produce Olympic caliber talent, whereas women’s softball enjoys widespread popularity including high school, and collegiate, NCAA level competition at most schools in the US, and similar competition in other countries heretofore competing in Olympic women’s softball.

Baseball appears like the rejected suitor, looking around for a prom date, after being rejected by the more popular girl they really wanted to take to the dance.

The reaction by the proponents of women’s softball was the same as mine – women’s baseball ?

“I didn’t think many women were playing baseball,” said Porter, whose group has given the IOC the option of adding men’s softball to the sport.

Porter went on to say “That’s fine, if they want to involve females. All sports should do that.”

But the underlying message seemed clear: Women’s baseball is nowhere near as widespread as women’s softball, which is more suitable as an Olympic sport.

I confess my own knowledge of women’s baseball leagues is limited, and I found myself wondering if my reaction was just the flip side of those people whose comments we often hear “Oh, men play softball too?”. We all know the story behind the movie “A League of Their Own”, the WWII era movie about a women’s baseball league, and that of the “Silver Bullets” women’s baseball team which toured in the 1990’s, and enjoyed some interest, though more for novelty than anything else.

The baseball folks insist that there are a lot of women playing baseball, and therefore it should be considered for Olympic status. The news story making that argument appears after the jump, below.

It occurred to me that men’s fastpitch (softball) might be the other side of this coin – that our profile in the world of sports is so much smaller than that of women’s softball, that the idea of adding the men’s game to the world stage is not taken any more seriously than that of adding women’s baseball. Lack of knowledge about the men’s game is widespread, leading to misconceptions like this one at (appropriately) Yahoo:

There is no men’s softball team, but there is a men’s baseball team. There is only a women’s softball teamand “…Men’s softball are for the weekend hackers”

Certainly, there is high level competition in men’s softball — the ISC World Tournament each year, and the once-every-four-years Olympic style competition, the ISF World Championships (coincidentally being played this summer). I am not aware of anything on a similar plane for women’s baseball. (email me if you are, jim (at) fastpitchwest (dot) com.)

So rather than dismissing the idea out of hand, I did a bit of reading on women’s baseball. The website women’s baseball organization mentioned in the news story American Women’s Baseball Federation: http://www.awbf.org/ dates back to 2002, and most of the event touted are of very recent vintage, covering tournaments played only during the last few years. Hardly comparable to the ISC, whose events date back to the 1950’s. Or the 48 years over which the ISF has held its World Championships for men’s softball.

Even the folks pushing women’s baseball concede the lack of widespread competition by women in baseball, at least within the United States:

Jim Glennie, president of the American Women’s Baseball Federation, said he didn’t know of any high schools in the U.S. that offer women’s baseball, and that girls who want to play baseball beyond Little League face an uphill battle. Some girls have been able to land roster spots on boy’s high school baseball teams, but those are rare, he said.

The website also touts a book, “Stolen Bases – Why American Girls Don’t Play Baseball”

So color me skeptical of this latest effort on behalf of women’s baseball. If I were a betting man, I’d say advantage Porter and the softball group. That said, I am less than optimistic that men’s softball will be able to hold onto the coattails of women’s softball.

Porter’s proposal was the first real glimmer of hope that I am aware of that men’s softball would ever achieve Olympic status. The marketing effort so far, however, has continued to focus on reinstatement of the women’s game, with the efforts to add the men’s game little more than a footnote in the press releases and promotional materials that I have viewed. I confess that my initial excitement at the notion of men’s softball being added has been tempered by the reality that at present, the effort to make that a reality remains rather limited.

Other than the Porter press release, what other promotion of the idea have you seen? (Please email to me if you have seen any) A preliminary Google search doesn’t turn up any. (though it did turn up one water polo fan who had this to say:

“Furthermore, I don’t think it makes sense to allow for women’s baseball nor men’s softball to become Olympic sports. I’d rather see canoe water polo”

.

Not to worry, you won’t find a post at Morning Brief tomorrow titled “Canoe Water Polo?”

News story on the competing bids of baseball and softball after the jump.

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