Softball Tips - How Important is Fun?

Guest post by Ken Krause, Life in the Fastpitch Lane blog

"There's No Having Fun Here"

The other day I heard a story that just made my skin crawl. The incident in question occurred during tryouts for a local team.

The newly installed coach gathered the high school age girls together and announced, "If any of you are here for fun, you're in the wrong place."

Forgive me, but at what point did playing softball cease to be about having fun? When did winning a softball game, tournament or even national championship become so all-fired important that fun is no longer a part of the equation?

Every study that's ever been done about youth sports shows that the #1 reason kids sign up for a sport is to have fun. Those same studies also show that the number #1 reason they quit playing is because the game is no longer fun for them.

There's nothing wrong with taking the game seriously and working hard to do your best. There's nothing wrong with drilling hard and practicing (or playing) all-out. Those are good things. But working hard and having don't have to be mutually exclusive.

One of my favorite baseball movies is Mr. Baseball, starring Tom Selleck. In it, Selleck is a MLB player who is struggling, and ultimately gets traded to a team in Japan, where he runs into the typical tough but wise manager.

In many ways Selleck's character is an overgrown kid, but he has a great perspective on one important aspect. When the Japanese team is all uptight because of the manager, he points out  that "Baseball is a game, and games are supposed to be fun."

He also points out that no one starts into baseball because they want to work. They want to play. That's why it's called "playing" baseball.

The same applies to softball, of course. While coaches (and parents) may be focused solely on wins, the players are often more about the total experience.

Yes, in the words of Nuke Lalush, winning is more fun than losing. But if you're winning all the time and being miserable about it, sooner or later those players are going to find somewhere else to be than that team — and maybe something else to do than play softball.

Winning is great. Getting scholarships to help pay for school is great. Striving to be part of something bigger than yourself is great. But are any of them worth being unhappy all season (or career) long?

My advice to players and parents is this: if anyone tells you that if you're joining a team for fun you're in the wrong place, take their advice and leave. Life is too short to take something that should be enjoyable and make it awful.

If you won't take my advice, then listen to the words of the King of rock and roll himself — Elvis Presley — who once said, "If it ain't fun, the King don't do it." That's why Elvis was and always will be the King.

Anyway, that's the way I see it.