Men's Fastpitch question

[Westwind]

I am from the same area MS is from. There used to be several men's teams in this area and in the summer of '85 all my buddies and I graduated from high school and three of them made the switch from baseball to fastpitch. They were all very good bb players and they all said it was much tougher to hit in fp. They played with some of the toughest and most athletic "old dudes" I ever saw. I'm going to give props to one in particular, Merle Prins. He was not a large man but he played well into his 50's. He was a quick, wiry old farmer who was the nicest guy you could ever meet but had a look about him that you knew not to mess with him. He was tough as nails. I clearly remember 18 an 20 something kids in their prime saying how he could easily outplay them and they wouldn't dream of messing with him on their best day. He passed away a couple years ago and he had not played for many years but his name comes up regularly.

They had a good pitcher who I believe taught himself to pitch and he pitched many years. He then taught one of the other guys on the team to pitch. One of the dads on my dd's 10u team played with that team many years later. He is a very accomplished athlete. I can tell you that men's fp attracts a special breed, it could not be farther from what I have seen in sp.

 

[straightleg]

My dad who is in his mid 80's played on the deck of the USS Leyte. He said men from all over the country played and it was real tough competetion.
I guess playing on a moving ship made it a bit more interesting, and a ball off the deck was not coming back.



SL

 

[sleepwalker]

I spent every summer until I graduated high school following the softball fields throughout Utah, California and the Pacific Norhtwest watching my dad pitch softball. My dad would tell me stories about pitching with Larry H. Miller, before Larry had money. I remember watching ball games at Howarth park in Santa Rosa, California when he threw for the Guanella Brothers. I remember spending the summer in Sunnyvale when he threw for LeBlancs Barons. He threw in the Pacific Northwest for the remainder of his days except for one year when he returned to pitch for Guanella/LeBlancs when the players walked away in pursuit of more money right before the softball season began. I used to watch monster pitching battles when he threw against Seattle Peterbuilt and Seattle Pay'n'Pak. Lake Oswego in Portland had a strong team as well as Yakima Pepsi, Olympia and others.

Men's softball was king back then. The sponsors were good and winning sponsor's received a lot of press on the sports pages of the newspapers. There were a lot of very good teams. Competition was fierce. If you didn't have a strong pitcher, you didn't stand a chance. Men's fastpitch was so prevalent that you didn't have to go very far to find 32 team double elimination tournaments.

I watched the New Zealander's throw for some Canadien teams and they changed the game men's fastpitch forever. I remember being at a tournament and watching a New Zealand pitcher dominate a game after crow hopping and releasing the ball from about 40'. All of the other men's pitchers started crow hopping and making it so deliberate that the umpires started calling illegal pitches on every pitcher. The men (from every team) continued to throw from about 40' for the rest of the tournament, because if the umps would have called a crow hop, the tournament would have been cancelled. Men played to win and many times it is easier to throw illegal pitches than it is to throw legal pitches.

Sponsoring of teams became more and more expensive as the better teams would recruit better talent and offer trips to major tournaments across the USA and Canada. The Salt Lake City tournament drew teams from all across the country. British Columbia Canada would draw national attention over the years.

The game changed somewhere during the late 80's or early 90's. The game went from double elimination tournaments to 3 or 4 game guarantees with single or double elimination tournaments. I remember sitting at a ball park in the early 90's where my dad's team came through the loser's bracket and won the first game of the chanpionship series. After the game, the team from Seattle said that they didn't want to play again so they called the teams co-tourament champions. My dad would have stayed out there and pitched until his arm fell off. I asked him what he thought about it and he just looked at me and said America is changing. The game of men's fastpitch softball was no longer about winning and losing, mediocrity was becoming acceptable in the sports world.

I read an article that Coach Candrea wrote several years ago. The jist of the article was similar to the last paragraph. Candrea wrote that the girls fastpitch athletes that are reaching college these days are worse that those from the previous decade(s). Girls fastpitch Travel Ball doesn't teach girls the urgency to compete and win. Whereas the game started out in the double elimination tournament format and it was win or go home. The new game is the travel ball game, with time limits, 4 game guarantees and tournaments every weekend. An hour and a half time limit 5 inning game isn't a complete game of softball because there is so much that can happen in those last two innings. The travel ball game is about tournaments making money, every kid playing, padding your stats and maybe getting a college scholarship. If a girl doesn't win the tournament, she is content that she got in 30 to 45 innings in on the weekend and got a good work out. At the end of the day a girl playing in 120 games during a travel ball season may have got in 70 to 80 complete 7 inning games or that many game equivilencies. Is Candrea right?

I know my dad never forgot the day when the men's fastpitch softball changed forever. Maybe the guy who came up with the saying, "It's not whether you win or lose, but how you play the game," changed the way sports are played throughout the US. I'm willing to bet that A) he didn't play the game or B) he didn't put in the time to become very skilled at the game.

So, when your out watching girls fastpitch softball in the Pacific Northwest and the old grey haired umpire behind the plate is moving slow, please don't yell at him, but thank him because he is giving back to the game he loves.

 

[Cannonball]

I started playing FP when a local team approached me to play SS. I was playing travel baseball and still just 17. A few other HS kids were also playing. A few of them went on to play with me on the same team and then on ADM which was a national power. After HS, I was playing baseball, fast-pitch and slow-pitch. Baseball was first and then, which ever team called me on a given day determined where I played. At some point, the fast-pitch team became more interested in fighting than playing. One of the top slow-pitch teams in the area asked me to play and we started traveling. I found that while I was an amateur, I could still make a lot of money playing slow-pitch. In fact, one guy was so crazy that he'd buy me all my meals and pay for my hotel room when we traveled. He owned a series of gas stations and a tavern or two and he wanted the best team around. So, I saw slow pitch overshadow fast-pitch in this area once known for fast-pitch. One league still survives. It is limited and everyone knows each other. Very little new blood.

 

[john reed]

sleepwalker what is your dads name?

 

[X pitcher]

sleepwalker what is your dads name?

John is your father's Ferris?

 

[X pitcher]

sleepwalker what is your dads name?

John is your father's Ferris?

 

[sleepwalker]

John,

I shot you a private message.

 

[Amy in AZ.]

Someone asked if the men's leagues had age groups. I doubt it. The women's game only had 2 age groups, 16U and 16 and over.

I tend to agree with the comments attributed to Coach Candrea. To further expand on that thought, I am not sure that playing year around helps the game. The girls bodies just would have to get worn out. Some that have played here at UofA, are playing with back pain.

Also, I can't figure out why pitching from a closer distance and with a smaller ball, doesn't help little girls play better. But, it doesn't seem to. If you wanted to play ball and was 10, you went to the local team and tried. Each little town had a team. But, you were playing along side a 15 yr. old. That is how we learned. I can remember a much older athlete telling me how much ground to cover, when I went out to 2nd base.

 

[Ajaywill]

I grew up in a small town in Northern Arizona in the 70s. At that time, there was a statewide league of about 12 teams playing Men's FP. Every summer Saturday night was spent at the ball park watching the local team play a DH against one of the other league teams.

There were large tournaments on Memorial Day and Fourth of July weekends. Our town parks department usually brought one or two players from New Zealand over for the summer to play, then we sent our players there during the winter (New Zealand summer) to play.

I have seen several outstanding pitchers, many in the various halls of fame. In my opinion, two things have killed Men's FP...

1. The rise of the SP game, where anybody can buy a $300 bat and be a home run hitter.
2. The rise of travel baseball for youth. FP softball was about the only option for the young baseball players after their HS and college seasons were over back in those days.

Some of the young kids learned to pitch just by watching and imitating the pitchers of the time. After you got the basic mechanics down, learning different grips to make the ball move a bit wasn't too hard. Sad to say that Men's FP is slowly dying....