Venezuela made their first-ever Olympic softball appearance at the 2008 Summer Games. (Photo by Qiang FU)

2008 INTERNATIONAL SOFTBALL YEAR IN REVIEW
2009-01-05

It's time for our annual look back at the year that has just gone by, relative to the world of international softball.

Among the highlights in 2008, a new Olympic softball champion was crowned while the International Softball Federation’s Jr. Men’s World Championship (19-and-under) saw a repeat winner. Here’s one final review of some of last year’s goings-on.

Things started off on a somber note, but we would be remiss if we didn’t remember the JANUARY 2008 passing of Merle Butler. A member of the ISF Hall of Fame, Mr. Butler was the ISF Director of Umpires at the time of his death and is still missed by many both in his home country (USA) as well as abroad.

In FEBRUARY Women’s Sports Cares, as part of their preparations to launch Women’s Sports Television, gave international softball an additional online presence with the inclusion of seven video offerings on the Web. Plus, a significant off-field development took place in Russia where ISF President Don Porter announced a regional training center for Eastern Europe, which would open on May 1st, 40km outside of Moscow.

Canada won the International Challenge Series played at the 2000 Olympic softball venue. (Photo from Softball Australia)

MARCH was highlighted by the International Challenge Series in Sydney, Australia. The event featured four teams that were preparing for the Olympics in August: Australia, Canada, China, and Japan. During the tournament, 17 games were streamed live via the World Championship Sports Network.

The focus shifted to the men in APRIL as the Oceania regional qualifier for the 2009 ISF Men’s World Championship took place in New Zealand. The host country and Australia emerged from the tournament to gain berths in this year’s event in Canada.

Also that month, the first meeting of the African Softball Confederation took place in Zambia.

The NJCAA Division I national championship was back at the ISF complex for its third straight year. (ISF photo)

There was extensive regional activity in MAY, including a national championship for junior colleges at the ISF’s world headquarters in Plant City, Florida. That wrapped up three years of the ISF hosting that event at its complex.

As alluded to earlier, JUNE featured Australia successfully defending their ISF Jr. Men’s World Championship title, although they needed an extra inning in the gold medal game to get past Canada to do so. The 12-nation event included some games having live audio broadcasts online.

Australia once again hoisted the Jr. Men's World Championship trophy. (Photo by Margo Millette)

Junior men, men, women… about all that’s left is coed. 2008 had that too as the 6th European Coed Slowpitch Championship took place in England in JULY. Great Britain won the event, which was given good coverage by the BBC, both on television as well as on the Internet.

Speaking of the Internet, the ISF made a significant increase in its online presence in July with: the announcement of pages on Facebook for both the world governing body and the Olympic reinstatement campaign, a YouTube channel for international softball, and, an initiative with Sportingo that allows fans to write about the sport for publication online.

Japan had good reason to be all smiles in July and August, winning the Canada Cup and then the Olympic softball competition. (Photo by Vision Quest)

One other notable July competition was the 15th Canada Cup, an ISF-sanctioned event in British Columbia that featured some of the teams on their way to the Olympics. (The month ended with the European Men’s Championship starting up in Denmark. It ended just a couple days into August.)

Without question AUGUST was the biggest month of the year for international softball as the sport made its fourth appearance in the Summer Olympics. Held in Beijing, China, the Games showcased women’s fast pitch softball teams from eight countries, including Japan, who won their first-ever Olympic softball gold medal.

After the competition ended, the ISF president announced that the following year in August a Youth Softball World Cup (16-and-under fast pitch) would be staged in a major European city. Later in 2008 the Easton Foundation was named as the title sponsor of the event, which was awarded to Prague.

The Zone 6 Championship in November sent South Africa and Botswana (above) on to the ISF Men's World Championship. (Photo courtesy of Softball South Africa)

While softball played on in different locales throughout the world in SEPTEMBER, it was an off-field announcement that gained significant attention. The ISF revealed plans to form an Athlete Ambassadors program to more closely involve elite female softball players from around the globe in the Olympic reinstatement campaign, BackSoftball.

That same month Bob Stanton was named as the ISF Director of Umpires.

Since we’ve covered junior men, men, women, and coed, that only leaves junior women’s play, which did have its place among the 2008 competitions. The XII South American Jr. Women’s Championship (17-and-under) was held in OCTOBER in Venezuela, where Brazil took the title. (Another regional junior women’s event had been held a couple months earlier in El Salvador, where players born in or after 1988 competed in the 5th Central American Junior Female Championship.)

In NOVEMBER the Zone 6 tournament was held in South Africa, who won the event in both men’s and women’s play. The winners, along with Botswana, qualified for the 2009 ISF Men’s World Championship.

Off the field that month, a six-person team made a presentation to the International Olympic Committee Programme Commission as part of the ongoing efforts to get women’s fast pitch softball reinstated for the 2016 Olympics.

On a similar note, BackSoftball had a presence in DECEMBER at the National Fastpitch Coaches Association’s annual convention in Marco Island, Florida. The ISF also announced the dates for the first Athlete Ambassadors meeting (January 11-13), which helps open up the New Year, sure to be a significant one in the history of international softball.

(For other and more detailed news on these and additional stories from 2008, visit the Latest News Archives as well as the Communications section, which has the full list of press releases and newsletters.)