With the popularity of the Softball games in the recent past, there has been a great push for the sport to be introduced in major sporting tournaments. This has seen the sport being recognized at various international sporting events making it one of the most popular upcoming sporting events. Just like baseball, softball is a field event that involves hitting the ball with a bat and another player running to get hold of the ball just as in the baseball game. The only difference is that the softball field is much smaller, and the games pace is faster as compared to baseball.
2020 Olympics
Since 2008 Softball has not been included on the events list during the previous tournaments Softball but come 2020 Softball and baseball will make a return to this international event. This is good news to the softball enthusiasts as they will have an opportunity to watch as the teams’ battle it out for the top honors. Yokohama and the Fakushima stadiums will host the softball and baseball events where for the softball games six men and women teams will grace the occasion. This inclusion comes after the International Olympic Committee (IOC) gave a nod to host countries to add more sports that they deemed fit for the event. Japan being a Softball power house saw this as an opportunity for them to give their national softball teams more exposure on an international level after the game was dropped after the 2008 Olympics.
Olympic qualifiers
Only six men and women teams will compete in the softball event during the 2020 edition. The qualifiers have already kicked off and the USA softball team booked the first slot after beating Japan in the 2018 World Championship and Japan being the Olympic hosts has automatically booked a slot. The other four teams will be determined through continental qualifiers with Europe-Africa (Winner qualify), North-South America (top finishers qualify) and the Asia- Oceania (winner qualify)