By Garland Cooper:

When you look at the Olympic softball team what do you see? You see champions, Gold Medalists, National Champions, and All-Americans from all over the country right? WRONG. You see champions, Gold Medalists, National Champions, and All-Americans from the western part of the country. Where are the elite players from the east, Midwest, and south?

Ok, so USA does have Cat Osterman who played at Texas and is originally from Texas, Monica Abbott who played at Tennessee and Kelly Kretchman who played at Alabama and is from Florida. Other than that the entire Olympic Team is made up of players from the Pac 10 and players who are originally from the west, specifically California, with a few exceptions who hail from Arizona. Even Abbott, who was not a Pac 10 player, is from California and the Midwest and east aren’t even represented!

Is this because there are better athletes out in the west or because the system has limited itself to choosing only the elite athletes from that region?

It may have been true in the past that western softball was more advanced that softball from other regions but that is quickly becoming less and less visible. While the Pac 10 may remain the most dominant conference in the game, several conferences are catching up.

Just this year the Sun Belt Conference, Atlantic Coast Conference, SEC and the Big 12 were all represented at the Women’s College World Series making up five of the eight teams present. Yes, the Pac 10 still beat out the SEC with the most teams at the tournament, but the majority of the colleges there were not from the west.

In 2007 it was the same story, three Pac 10 teams made it to the dance along with five non-western teams. If you take it even farther back to 2005 when the Pac 10 was even more dominant, Michigan won the National Title! Where were all those players in the Olympics?

It is shocking that there are only three players not from the west that are good enough to play in the Olympics.

Jennie Ritter and Jessica Merchant played on the Michigan National Championship team in 2005. As a team captain, Jessica Merchant was one of the best hitters and shortstops in the game. Ritter beat anyone and everyone on the mound. Where were they in these Olympics? They both played on the National Team at some point but never made it to the Olympics squad.

Look at Angela Tincher form Virginia Tech. She threw a no-hitter against the USA Team, gave them their only loss of the Pre-Olympic Tour, and brought her unassuming Virginia Tech team to the Women’s College World Series. How did she go unnoticed?

Could it be that there is a bias within the USA program towards the Pac 10 and west coast players? Candrea himself also coaches at Arizona, which probably makes it hard for him to be unbiased come tryouts. He watches those Pac 10 players all year long and even coaches some of them! Now that he has retired, it will be interesting to see who will be his successor and how that will change the culture of the program.

It’s not just about the Pac 10 anymore. Colleges from all over the country are showing their strength and starting to level the playing field. There are talented athletes from all over the country, athletes that perhaps aren’t given the recognition they deserve because of the state they are from or the school they attend.

It is a shame that there are possible biases within the USA program because it does not ensure that the best 15 players in the country are chosen to represent USA. Were our best nine on the field this year? Who knows? It would be nice, however, to have a true representation of our country; a team comprised of the best athletes in the whole country, not just of the best athletes from one region.