Fast-pitch softball should focus on youth

CNMI Sports Hall of Famer Tony Satur said he would rather stay in the background and let a younger group take care of re-organizing the sport of fast-pitch softball in the CNMI.

CNMI Sports Hall of Famer Tony Satur, right, poses with Franco Santos at the former’s office at Laolao Bay Golf & Resort. Satur, who was enshrined to the Hall of Fame for more than four decades of playing softball, is now Laolao’s golf course operations manager. (Jon Perez)

Satur was one of the CNMI’s first multi-sport athletes after also playing basketball and baseball at a high level. He’s now busy with golf being a member of several local associations and with his position as golf course operations manager at Laolao Bay Golf & Resort.

Satur, however, gained fame in softball after becoming the youngest player in the Men’s Island-Wide Fast Pitch League as a 14-year-old in the late 1960s.

Softball, fast-pitch or slow-pitch, currently has no organized association. There is also no fast-pitch tournament either in men’s or women’s, except for the high school girls softball event in the Marianas Interscholastic Sports Organization.

“If ever softball gets organized and formed into an association, I would like to have an advisory capacity, work in the background and let the new group handle things,” said Satur when asked on his thoughts in reviving the sport in the CNMI.

“I’m willing to sit as a member of their board I would support the organization, I will help in anyway that I can,” added the many-time CNMI national men’s softball team member.

Several individuals have tried to revive and form an organized softball association, but failed to attract attention and fizzled out.

Satur, who is also a certified baseball umpire, said softball needs committed people for it to be organized and once organized should focus more with youth development.

“We need people who are committed to get things started. Organizing an association and a league is good for the development of players,” said the 59-year-old Satur.

Satur added that it wouldn’t be difficult to organize a women’s fast-pitch softball league since there are already high school players.

“It would be nice to have fast-pitch games again. There are a lot of good high school players in MISO. Just form four to five teams and make them play after the school year is over,” he said.

“That would generate interest back to softball and it would the players develop their skills. The best players can also get the chance to earn athletic scholarships and play in the U.S.”

He added that the only organized softball league now is slow-pitch where most of the female fast-pitch players are seeing action.

Satur said he was the one who came up with the 1-ball, 1-strike, and 1-hour time limit rules in slow-pitch games to speed up the matches.

Former Oceania Softball Federation development officer Andrew Purdon stayed for a couple of months on Saipan to help revive interest in the sport in 2007. He held coaching clinics and youth training but sadly died before fully re-organizing the sport.