March 1, 2008 - E-mails from hundreds of young girls end up on Don Porter’s desk. They all ask pretty much the same question. They want to know why they won’t be able to play in the Olympics when they get older. They’re committed to their and sport and their dream is to repesent their country and win a gold medal.
Their sport is softball and that dream won’t be realized for the many girls growing up with an eye on the 2012 London Olympics. That’s because softball was eliminated on a 52-52 deadlock in a 2005 vote by the International Olympic Committee (IOC). The game will be played this summer in Beijing, but after that it’s anyone’s guess whether the sport will be allowed back in the games.
Porter, the longtime head of the International Softball Federation, is on a mission. He’s campaigning early on behalf of Back Softball to get a yes vote on softball when the IOC revisits the subject next year.
The odds aren’t in softball’s favor, but Porter is hardly deterred. This is a guy, after all, who spent 29 years, six months and 13 days getting the sport into the Olympics in the first place.
He’s hard at work, and if he ever needs a reminder of why he’s doing it all he has to do is look at the e-mails on his desk. Those girls won’t be playing in London, but it’s his mission that they will be playing wherever the 2016 Olympics are held.
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