I have a friend who told me recently that he thought softball was the least well-played sport in college. He pointed to the number of errors and mental mistakes, the level of athleticism.
Well, here, I'll quote:
If you really pay attention to what's going on, the girls don't have a clue how to play the game, and a LOT of the coaches don't know what they're doing, especially with situational stuff. If you watch college football, baseball, basketball, gymnastics, golf, tennis, track, cross country, volleyball, swimming, you walk away amazed at the athleticism and level of talent and play. I rarely feel that way after I watch a college softball game.
So what college sports do you feel are played at the highest level?
My response to the above is that what he's seeing is not the quality of play, but the difficulty of the sport itself.
Softball is one of the hardest sports, perhaps the hardest. There are many more opportunities to look foolish in softball than other sports. Hitting has been called the hardest thing in sports, and then hitters must take the field and make split-second fielding decisions and plays that are pressurized by base paths that are only 60 feet apart.
Compare that to swimming and track, which are simple sports. There is great athleticism, and it requires great work ethic, but how challenging is the competition itself? You just swim to one side and back as hard as you can. You never describe a track meet or swim meet as sloppy, but softball and baseball games are labeled that all the time. There's more opportunity to look bad or mess up.
Volleyball also is a much simpler game. It's the same half-dozen points/scenarios being played out over and over. I recently watched a JV volleyball game and was surprised at how entertaining it was and how long the points went. But I also concluded that the entertainment came from watching an easier sport. It's why volleyball is popular in PE classes. It's easier to reach a level of competency.
What do y'all think? How does softball rank among other sports?
Well, here, I'll quote:
If you really pay attention to what's going on, the girls don't have a clue how to play the game, and a LOT of the coaches don't know what they're doing, especially with situational stuff. If you watch college football, baseball, basketball, gymnastics, golf, tennis, track, cross country, volleyball, swimming, you walk away amazed at the athleticism and level of talent and play. I rarely feel that way after I watch a college softball game.
So what college sports do you feel are played at the highest level?
My response to the above is that what he's seeing is not the quality of play, but the difficulty of the sport itself.
Softball is one of the hardest sports, perhaps the hardest. There are many more opportunities to look foolish in softball than other sports. Hitting has been called the hardest thing in sports, and then hitters must take the field and make split-second fielding decisions and plays that are pressurized by base paths that are only 60 feet apart.
Compare that to swimming and track, which are simple sports. There is great athleticism, and it requires great work ethic, but how challenging is the competition itself? You just swim to one side and back as hard as you can. You never describe a track meet or swim meet as sloppy, but softball and baseball games are labeled that all the time. There's more opportunity to look bad or mess up.
Volleyball also is a much simpler game. It's the same half-dozen points/scenarios being played out over and over. I recently watched a JV volleyball game and was surprised at how entertaining it was and how long the points went. But I also concluded that the entertainment came from watching an easier sport. It's why volleyball is popular in PE classes. It's easier to reach a level of competency.
What do y'all think? How does softball rank among other sports?
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