A Japanese schoolgirl is getting a shot at pro baseball. Finally we're starting to see some equality.
"Eri Yoshida, seen here, a 16-year-old schoolgirl with a mean knuckleball has been selected as the first woman ever to play alongside the men in Japanese professional baseball."
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20081117/sp_wl_afp/lifestylejapansportsbaseball_081117063048
As a kid I desperately wanted to play baseball. I wanted to play center field for the Mets. Every night I oiled my glove, tucked a ball inside it, and put it under my pillow. My dad was a little league coach. He'd take me out in the yard and we'd work on fundamentals. We worked on getting behind the glove. Not being afraid of the ball. Dealing with it when a grounder runs up your glove and hits you in the face. Getting under fly balls. We'd go to the field sometimes and I'd shag balls or work on hitting.
I didn't get to play baseball at all. Not once. Not ever. They told me, "Girls don't play baseball. You can play softball." I despise softball. Softball is a hideous bastardization of a beautiful sport. The ball is too big, as if to say the players are stupid and need a bigger object. There's no stealing. There's a general lack of craft. The sportsmanship was awful. The other girls were nasty toward each other and me. There was no cooperation. Outfielders refused to hit the cutoff because of their ego problems. So even if balls were fielded well, they dribbled in messily to the infield, and we missed getting outs. The other girls didn't want to spend extra time working. They wanted to spend the extra time gossiping and talking about who they liked or didn't like.
The only time I got to work on anything worthwhile was with my dad. He never told me that I wouldn't get to play because I was a girl. He never told me that fundamentals didn't matter because I could just wear my hair cute. If he thought I might cry he'd tell me to suck it up. There was no quitting. There was no complaining. Too bad I never got to use any of that. I played softball for about 6 years and then realized one day that it wasn't a temporary thing. I'd never get to play baseball. I had no interest in playing girls' fast-pitch softball anymore. I quit. After 9th grade, I never played again.
Baseball wasn't a singular incident. I wanted to play ice hockey. They told me no. Girls don't play hockey. I got to take figure skating instead. I quit after a year. Every time I wanted to play a "boys" sport, they'd give me some lame substitute or tell me I'd hurt my breasts. Yes, I'm serious. I was 8 years old when I wanted to play hockey. I didn't have breasts. I pointed this out to the skating manager and she just looked uncomfortable.
Good for you, Eri Yoshida. I hope you redefine baseball as we know it.
For those of you who have daughters, I have a little bit of humble advice. If your girl wants to take a sport, and some stupid coach discriminates against her for being female, you should seriously consider legal action. We cannot continue to tolerate oppression. This is 2008 and we still have to struggle to get a shot at equality.
1 comment:
Ok, so I get your frustrations with the "girls can't play ball thing." But, from someone who was a fast-pitch softball pitcher in college, I used to love it when guys would challenge me to pitch to them. There's nothing like watching the star player for the university baseball team strike out on a riseball, and walk away with a much smaller ego than he had originally approached the challenge.
On the flip side,I would also agree that the sport of fastpitch softball is also plagued with equally egotistical females. But it sure was fun!
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