That shouldn’t surprise anyone. But, the sport and the way they cheated might.
In the softball Super Regional against Washington, Oklahoma scored a run in the 1st inning on a hit and THREE hit batters. The Washington coach protested that the batters boxes weren’t the right distance from home plate, allowing the Oklahoma hitters to lean in and get hit by balls on the inside corner. The umpires refused to measure the distance.
The edge of the box is supposed to be 6 inches from the edge of home plate. It was clearly less. It also was clear than instead of being done with a template, as is the practice, the inside line of the batters boxes had been hand drawn. To compound the evidence of cheating, ESPN showed a picture of the batters boxes from last week’s regionals in Norman on top of the live shot of it from this game, and the difference was obvious.
Oklahoma has the top-ranked team in the country. They are the highest scoring team. Most of their games have been ended by the mercy rule. When they played three games against then #5 Texas, all three were mercy rule games. After Georgia broke their 38 game winning streak, they ended the next two games of the series in mercy rule wins.
Yet, their coach still finds it necessary to cheat. Facing a Washington pitcher noted for pitching on the inside corner, she decided to move the batters box to let her players stand closer to the plate and lean into pitches to be hit. The umpires went along with it by refusing to measure the distance despite the obvious tampering.
After the first two innings, the OU batters took their stances farther away from the plate, a clear indication that their stances earlier were not normal.
Apparently, Washington can protest the game. But, the chalk will be long gone before anyone can measure the distance between the plate and the batters box. It’s OU’s field after all and it’s groundskeepers. So, nothing will happen.
Ironically, 3 runs scored by OU after returning to their normal stances would have been enough to win anyway.
It’s sad to realize that the win at all costs culture has enveloped even sports like softball.
In the softball Super Regional against Washington, Oklahoma scored a run in the 1st inning on a hit and THREE hit batters. The Washington coach protested that the batters boxes weren’t the right distance from home plate, allowing the Oklahoma hitters to lean in and get hit by balls on the inside corner. The umpires refused to measure the distance.
The edge of the box is supposed to be 6 inches from the edge of home plate. It was clearly less. It also was clear than instead of being done with a template, as is the practice, the inside line of the batters boxes had been hand drawn. To compound the evidence of cheating, ESPN showed a picture of the batters boxes from last week’s regionals in Norman on top of the live shot of it from this game, and the difference was obvious.
Oklahoma has the top-ranked team in the country. They are the highest scoring team. Most of their games have been ended by the mercy rule. When they played three games against then #5 Texas, all three were mercy rule games. After Georgia broke their 38 game winning streak, they ended the next two games of the series in mercy rule wins.
Yet, their coach still finds it necessary to cheat. Facing a Washington pitcher noted for pitching on the inside corner, she decided to move the batters box to let her players stand closer to the plate and lean into pitches to be hit. The umpires went along with it by refusing to measure the distance despite the obvious tampering.
After the first two innings, the OU batters took their stances farther away from the plate, a clear indication that their stances earlier were not normal.
Apparently, Washington can protest the game. But, the chalk will be long gone before anyone can measure the distance between the plate and the batters box. It’s OU’s field after all and it’s groundskeepers. So, nothing will happen.
Ironically, 3 runs scored by OU after returning to their normal stances would have been enough to win anyway.
It’s sad to realize that the win at all costs culture has enveloped even sports like softball.
