I’ve been writing a regular youth softball column for a very long time. Sometimes I think I write an exceptional column, sometimes I’m happy that I was able to just get something together in time for the deadline. But for this month, and for our issue coming out in two months, I have something new I want to try. What I want is for you, my loyal readers, to complete a story for me.

Basically, I’ve written a little short story, and I need you to fill in the blanks in the story to make it complete. I have no idea how this is going to work out, or if it will work out at all, but I wanted to try a little reader interaction and see what comes of it. This is cutting edge journalism (or perhaps being lazy, I’m not sure which). I just hope you take a little time to help me out here, because without you, this story will never be completed.

Following are several multiple choice items. It is your job to select one from each of these items and email your selections to me. As an example, for Item 1, if you wanted to select option A, you would email me Item 1, A, and so on through all 11 items. I’ll keep track of all the selections I receive, and use the most popular responses to complete my story. The final story will appear here in two months, due to the timing of our publication deadlines. Okay, now make your selections and email them to me at floydeunslip@yahoo.com

Item 1
A. local bar
B. daughter’s hitting lesson
C. work
D. police station
Item 2
A. major college coach
B. local teen Casanova
C. town drunk
D. famous travel ball coach
Item 3
A. should change sports
B. has great skills
C. is really good looking
D. smells funny
Item 4
A. acted like I didn’t hear him
B. thanked him
C. punched him in the nose
D. started laughing
Item 5
A. my psychologist
B. my banker
C. my best friend
D. my palm reader
Item 6
A. lie
B. drink a lot
C. pester people
D. chase softball players
Item 7
A. a pain in the butt
B. rude
C. nice
D. a stalker
Item 8
A. band
B. softball tournament
C. sand box
D. production of Guys and Dolls
Item 9
A. gawk
B. scout
C. get revenge
D. kidnap
Item 10
A. do you always get this dirty?
B. do you want to go on a date?
C. do you want a college
scholarhip?
D. do you want to play for my
team?
Item 11
A. move to a new city
B. got to college
C. challenge herself
D. go shopping

WHO’S COMMITTING TO WHOM?
The latest trend in college recruitment is the early verbal commitment by players. Any softball parent with a daughter entering their junior year in high school this fall is aware of this trend. Many are eager to make this commitment as early as possible, as high school players graduating in 2009 and even 2010, are ready to make a verbal commitment this coming summer.

There are various Internet sites where this practice is blasted or blessed, and the pros and cons discussed at great lengths, most notably spysoftball.com. It was just last summer that I was discussing this same issue with my cousin, whose daughter wanted very much to verbally commit early, a year before she was eligible to receive a scholarship offer. These discussions have fired up again in view of a few fairly high profile coaches leaving their school, which will affect these early verbal players.

During the time my daughter was involved in this process, which was not that long ago, the pressure was to sign a Letter of Intent during the early signing period. That was considered some type of prestige, as opposed to those who signed in the spring. While my daughter did sign early, I felt she might have had more options if she would have waited.

FOUL TIPS
Last month I wrote about the NCAA action to reduce the evaluation period for college coaches and noted the large logjam of tournaments on the four fall weekends that players can now be seen. Well, since then, the number of tournaments on these select weekends has grown substantially, further impacting the opportunities for players to be seen * * * * Well I didn’t take up much space here again this year thanking ESPN for their coverage of college softball, but I at least wanted to throw it in here as it is a great development for our sport. This year’s event was perhaps the most exciting ever. Congratulations to Arizona on their fantastic championship * * * * As always, you can contact me at floydeunslip@yahoo.com * * * * and so the ball rolls.