Which was the greater crime?

Back in February, I last wrote a blog about the blowout basketball game in Dallas where one high school team ran the score up on a weaker team. The losing team received national attention including being treated to a NBA game courtesy of Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban. Why so much attention over some damaged pride?

Two weeks ago, the So Cal Pumas 18u fastpitch softball team was a runaway locomotive, demolishing opponents by a cumulative score of 51-9 and an apparent championship match at the ASA 18A Nationals in Las Vegas. At around 6:20am this train was derailed by a drunk driver who ran a red light and plowed into the team van at an estimated 60mph. Luckily nobody was killed. Four of the girls and the head coach were treated at a local hospital and released. The coach has a broken hand which now has three screws in it. One of the girls had braces which cut open her mouth, on brace poking a hole through her skin under her lip. She has nerve damage that may never go away.

After forfeiting their semifinal game, it appeared that the Pumas were finished. The coach had told the tournament director that they were done because of the coaching staff’s concerns for the girls health playing injured in 100+ degree heat. The girls had other ideas. The persuaded the coach to let them finish what they had started. They were guaranteed third place, even if they would forfeit their loser bracket game. (It’s a double elimination tournament.) Today I interviewed some of the girls and they said even if they lost, they wanted to go down fighting. They didn’t just want to be handed 3rd place and go home. They called the tournament director who then went to the Elyria Sundogs, who had already been told they would be in the championship game. The Sundogs had the option of enforcing the forfeit (The Pumas couldn’t be ready to play until 10:30am, game time was 10:00am.) or allowing the game to start late and give the Pumas a chance to compete. The Sundogs did the right thing.

The Sundog players voted 100% to allow the Pumas to play. In so doing, they not only put a shot at the championship on the line (they had already lost one game early in the tournament and had won 11 straight in the losers bracket,) but also an automatic berth into next year’s championship tournament. The Pumas jumped out to a 4-0 lead. One girl was crying as she rounded the bases after hitting a home run. But the Sundogs came back and won 5-4.

The Pumas had a very strong chance of being ASA National Champions. For many girls this is a once in a lifetime experience. Their chance for stolen from them by a drunk driver. The Pumas have not received any national attention; no professional sports games; no talk show appearances (except on Kidz “n” Sports®,) no public outcry against the driver who slammed into their van. Had he been a spit second earlier he would have hit the side of the van and most assuredly would have killed somebody. The Sundogs have gone quietly back to Ohio having finished in 2nd place. They may have done better in the championship game if they had forced the forfeit and had been a little fresher. Few people are patting them on the back for their fantastic character and positive sportsmanship. As their coach, Duane Sunagel, told his girls, what they did will be remembered for years. Even if only by them and the Pumas.
I’ve tried to contact two professional sports teams to bring this story to their attention. I asked to see if they could provide some tickets for these girls to celebrate what they did accomplish and to honor their determination. One team may be able to do something. The other has not responded at all.

Is this where we are today in our society? Do we value our self-esteem more than justice? When I was a teen if you had a chance to run up 100 points in a basketball game you went for it. You weren’t trying to embarrass the opponent (ok, maybe a little) but there was something special about “turning over” the scoreboard. It was about how good your team was; not how bad your opponent was. And while it might not have been the best sportsmanship, good sportsmanship was everywhere around. Because you know the other team would look to be able to return the favor. And there was the awareness by all around that this was just a game. Your ego would recover from the beating. And you would be fine.

The Pumas cannot “return the favor.” They aren’t going to go out and get drunk and get in a car and go look for that driver to hit him back. 2009 Nationals are over. There are no do-overs. The Tampa Mustangs are the champs. They won fair and square. Short of some evidence that the drunk driver was related to the Tampa coach, (sorry conspiracy theorists), all consciences are clear. The Pumas finished “that close.” We will never know what might have happened and any two teams played. That’s sports.

So what now? How about looking up the Puma’s web site and the Sundogs’ web site and sending both of these teams an email praising the character of all of these girls. If you can’t find their sites send the emails to me and I’ll surely pass them on. The Puma girls I spoke with today are satisfied that they did all that they could; that they left it all on the playing field and were able to walk away from Las Vegas with their heads held high. There are no ill feelings and no regrets. Their original goal was to end up in the top five and they did just that. And the Sundogs. These girls also deserve a lot of praise and honor for their character and sportsmanship. They had no 2nd thoughts about their decision to let the Pumas play. They knew that was the right thing to do. They too are real champions.

I always remember Sue Enquist, the great UCLA softball coach saying that there are only two things you can control; your attitude and your effort. You can’t control the weather, the umpires, or a drunk driver running a red light. The Pumas and the Sundogs would make Enquist proud. They controlled their attitudes and they gave the best efforts that anyone could have asked for.

I hope we can all learn something from these two teams.

Umpires and Rules: Where does the blame go?

This last weekend, my daughter’s travel team was involved in a tournament in Walnut, CA. It was a great weekend, barring smoke from the fires in Chino Hills on Sunday. Showtime won their first elimination game 1-0 in the eighth inning when a run scored from third on an illegal pitch. Since our opponent was the home team, they still had one more chance to bat.

In their half of the inning, they started with the tie breaker runner on 2nd base. The batter bunted the girl to third, and then advanced to second as our defense chose to try to get the lead runner. So they had runners at 2nd and 3rd with nobody out. The tying run was 60 feet away with NOBODY out! Two infield ground balls and an infield pop fly later, the game was over and we won 1-0.

During the following game, a few of us parents were talking with the umpire, who had also covered the first game. He told us how he heard a few of the parents of the other team saying how the “umpires cost them the game.” And he said the same thing as I had mentioned earlier. They had a runner 60 feet away from tying the game with NOBODY out. The umpires did not cost them the game. The fact that three batters came up and could not move the runner cost them the game.

But let’s add to that. The fact that they went seven innings previously without scoring a run cost them the game. The fact that the pitcher was called a second time, (she had received a warning first, and then called for an illegal pitch earlier. All three times for rubbing her hand in the dirt then going to the ball without wiping her hand off.) cost them the game.

Parents and coaches, when you not only allow, but begin the blame game after a loss you are hurting your team and your players individually. If the players are allowed to pass off their failures on the umpires, or anything else for that matter, then it creates a situation where improvement does not take place. Why should I get better if it wasn’t my fault that I lost? It wasn’t my fault, the umpire cost me that run? It wasn’t my fault I left that curve ball over the middle of the plate, that girl shouldn’t have hit it so far. Do you see where I’m going?

Especially in a one run game, there are so many opportunities that a coach can demonstrate to his or her team where the team could have scored and won the game. Are umpires going to make mistakes now and then? Sure they are. But why are you in the position that the mistake would have such a dramatic impact? I know, there have been two or three situations in the NFL this year where umpire literally did cost somebody a game (and bettors thousands of dollars) with a bad call. But even in those games, I bet the coaching staff could easily point out several opportunities for their team to score aside from the situation where the errant call was made.

Parents and Coaches: Isn’t part of your job as a parent or a coach is to teach your players to be responsible for their actions; their improvement; their game? Then don’t minimize the effort you put in teaching these values by blaming the umpires, the weather, or the man from mars for your loss.

And lastly but not leastly…er least; to all governing bodies of the various sports. If you are not going to have your officials enforce rules then change the rules. Crow Hopping by pitchers in softball is one example. The other is batters hitting the ball out of the batters box; especially slappers.

During pool play on Saturday, we were up against the team that eventually won the tournament. They were a very disciplined team from Thousand Oaks. They had three or four batters who were lefty slappers. In slapping, it is not uncommon for the slapper to actually have one foot partially or all the way out of the box when making contact with the ball. By the rules, the batter should be called out.

I remember reading an article several years ago where the University of Arizona had conducted a study of left handed slappers and found that out of almost 500 at bats, only about 10 slappers got called out for being out of the box. In recent years it seems that the umpires are calling this rule a little more tightly. Now I don’t expect the umps to call every girl whose foot is half way over the line “out”. The ump’s first job is calling balls and strikes. But we had an at bat on Saturday where the batter got fooled on a change up and was at least three feet out of the box when she hit the ball. The umpire refused to call the rule. He even walked over and scratched out the line himself. Rules were put in place a year or so ago forbidding the batters to rub out the line as many slappers would do.

If you’re not going to enforce the rule, then throw the rule out. In this case the umpire was way off base not calling the girl out. In the case of crow hopping, there is a lot more “judgment” in what the umpire may see. Plus, there is the added confusion for some umps because it is legal in men’s fastpitch to crow hop. When you consider you have a pitcher like Jennie Finch, who upon finishing her delivery is releasing the ball (legally) about 37 feet from home plate, I don’t know that crow hopping gives a pitcher any more advantage than what Finch accomplishes legally. Enforce the rule or get rid of it. It creates a battle for coaches and umpires. It takes the umpire’s mind off more important aspects of the game. Plus it is just unprofessional.

Let’s make it easy. Make the rules, make the rules make sense, and enforce the rules. Let’s get back to enjoying the game.

The Difference Between Success and Failure:

TEAM USA Men's Basketball – The Redeemed Team – Gold Medal

Success or Failure? Success of course. The goal was set and achieved. The NBA players showed that they still know how to play “REAL” basketball.

TEAM USA Women's Softball – Silver Medal

Success or Failure? I guess it depends upon how you choose to look at the results.

Goal achieved? Not quite...but goals are never absolutes. Goals are a guideline to help us along the way. Goals are also not usually a “one event” thing. They are set to cover a specific period of time with a certain desired result to achieve.

If you want to look at one game, the final game, you could say we failed to win that game. But if this is how you look at your goals and your life, I think you would be robbing yourself of many blessings and the joy of many successes. Let's take a look at the bigger picture.

4 Olympics. 22 wins in a row. 32 wins, 4 losses. 3 Gold Medals, 1 Silver Medal. 51-1 margin of victory in the Athens games. 58 – 5 margin in all games including the final in Beijing. And what happened in the final game? Did we embarrass ourselves, did we play so terribly we shouldn't be allowed on a softball field ever again? Heck no!

Japan rose up to the challenge. Especially Ukiko Ueno. Tell me you wouldn't be proud of her if she was your daughter. 21 innings. Three games back to back to back. Her arm had to be ready to fall off. Did we let down...no..Ueno climbed up. Twice Team USA had the bases loaded. Ueno battled out. She only struck out 4 batters. We were hitting the ball. But sometimes the ball just doesn't go where you want it.

Laura Berg said it best when I interviewed her in Irvine on Team USA's final exhibition stop; “we have a target on our backs.” Everyone wants to go out on top she said.

Team USA Softball has probably achieved a far bigger goal than winning one Olympics. They have done more to advance the sport of softball worldwide than any other single group or event. They have opened new doors for thousands, maybe millions of young girls with the advancement of softball, and even more importantly, with the class and character that has been exhibited by Team USA.

There is a quote the “success breeds contempt.” The original quote by Aesop was “Familiarity breeds contempt.” Unfortunately, in youth sports today we often see the first practiced. Some kids get on the winning team at an early age. They become successful. And often, even though they may not be one of the top players on the team, they (many times following the words of parents) look down on the less successful or lesser known teams. They sometimes feel invincible and only see losing as ultimate failure. Parents have split friendships because of an error, or because one's son or daughter was not on “that” team.

Team USA Softball is still the best team in the world. As one friend of mine said “how is it that you beat a team two out of three and they get the gold medal?” This Olympics only served to remind us of the oldest and probably truest axiom in sports; “On any given day.....”

Congratulations Team USA Softball. You had one heck of a run. I believe softball will be back in the Olympics and when it is, Team USA will still be the team to beat. You have shown character, class, and professionalism on the world's biggest stage. You have shown what the Olympics are supposed to be about.