Softball was introduced to the Olympics for the 1996 Summer Games. The United States quickly dominated the sport that is present in few countries, winning all three of the past gold medals. The U.S. team is on its way to a fourth gold during this summer Olympics. Australia, Japan, and China round out the medal count with one silver each, two bronze for Australia, and one bronze for Japan. Only thirteen countries participate in Olympic softball. Along with the four above, Canada, Chinese Taipei, Cuba, Greece, Italy, Netherlands, New Zealand, Puerto Rico, and Venezuela participate. Softball is one of the more popular Olympic sports, as it is one of the team sports in the Olympics that rarely is in the spotlight professionally. However, the success of the United States has caused some controversy. Is it fair to have a sport so greatly dominated by one country? If it wasn't, basketball would have been eliminated with the 1992 dream team. Swimming would be gone because of Michael Phelps. Diving and gymnastics, both sports dominated by China, would be history. Even track, this year being dominated by Jamaica, and by the US clean sweeping the 400m hurdles, would be a thing of the past. Despite these obvious contradictions to the "Olympic softball domination", the IOC voted to drop softball and baseball from their Olympic programs in 2012. Soon, the IOC will be meeting again to vote on the program for 2016. While the fight for the 2012 Olympics is long since lost, a new war is beginning. This blog, written by someone who has seen first hand how this move can decimate young softball players, is dedicated to the fight to keep softball in the games.
If you have a comment, email me at AlexKost1319@gmail.com. Keep the fight going. Save softball for 2016.
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