| I.S.C. From The Ballpark |
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STARS OF THE INTERNATIONAL SOFTBALL CONGRESS
(A Tribute to Past, Present, and Emerging Stars of the ISC)
December, 2003 Star - - - SCOTT SMITH
Scott Smith loves the game of softball for the challenges.
Be it the team challenges or the individual challenges, it doesn't matter to Smith.
He wants the battle.
Last year at the ISC II Tournament in Appleton, Wisconsin, Smith got all of the battles he wanted.
The 27-year-old pitcher was a perfect 6-0 in the tournament, leading the Harriston, Ontario Mercurys to the ISC II crown.
Smith started seven games, was a perfect 6-0 and tossed 40.1 innings, allowing 10 earned runs. He walked 20 and struck out 46 batters.
Opposing batters hit just .168 against him.
Pretty good numbers huh!
Smith didn't know them.
"I really don't know what my numbers were," said Smith. "I think I won six games."
How many strikeouts?
"I don't know," he said.
Sounds like the perfect team player and he is.
He's also quite the individual performer and the fact that he was named the tourney's Most Outstanding Pitcher as well as its Most Valuable Player says something.
Smith is also in the game for the individual challenges that come with being a strikeout pitcher against a good batter.
"I enjoy pitching," Smith said. "As much as it's a team game, you can also have the one-on-one element to it.
"That's why I love pitching. And, I'll admit, I enjoy the strikeout. It shouldn't be a typical answer but I do.
"Over the years, rise ball pitchers tend to get more strikeouts."
Smith has been enjoying that battle since he was five. Growing up in Ontario, you play hockey in the winter and your summer sport is just there to keep you in shape until the next winter.
For Smith, he chose softball as his summer sport.
"When I was young it was the summer sport to play around here," said Smith. "Obviously, everyone knows growing up here it's hockey in the winter and whatever in the summer.
"Up here, it's softball."
He learned to compete with many of the guys he currently plays with on Harriston. Still, in league play he competes for another team as well.
But when it comes tournament time, it's Harriston and it's for the challenge.
But not the glory of statistics. Smith really doesn't know his own stats.
So what drives him?
"Honestly, I have no idea," he said. "It's more of a you get to know guys during the game.
"The first time through, you learn what guys do. You might have struck out the first five guys, the next guys rips you.
"You're going to remember that guy. As much as it's a one-on-one, it's figuring guys out.
"It's not the individual statistics I care about, it's the edge you want to get on each individual."
And what happens when an opponent wins the battle?
"There's always going to be that guy that gets you right," said Smith. "So yeah, if he hits the pitch you want to throw, you have to tip your cap to him.
"But at the same time, the next time the batter comes up, I'm going after him again... maybe not with the same pitch."
So what happens when Smith is in a big game, he's facing the opponents' number three hitter and there are runners on base?
"Obviously, there's a respect factor," Smith said. "You're number three or four hitter is obviously a power hitter.
You don't want to give them something to hit. You want to go after them though too and make them go after your pitch.
"You have to be confident in your pitch, that you can get that guy out when you need to."
For Smith, that pitch is usually the rise ball.
"Depending on the batter, my main pitch has been predominantly a rise," he said. "I've learned the change a little over the years, depending on the batter."
And he's learned quite the effective change up.
"Yeah, my change definitely isn't my best pitch but you have to throw it in there once in a while to keep batters honest," he said.
As the reigning Outstanding Pitcher and Most Valuable Player, Smith is a proponent of the ISC II.
"I think that it's a good experience for players," he said. "There are a lot of ball players that, given the opportunity, could easily play with the guys that are playing ISC all the time. But for whatever reason they can't be there.
"It gives guys more of an opportunity to play for something that's worth playing for. It gets some recognition for them as well, I guess.
"I mean, anybody that goes to the ISC II Tournament obviously loves playing ball. And there are some good ball players, no doubt about it."
Smith readily recognizes the vital role of the ISC - II program in giving the hometown teams (Belmore is just 20 minutes from Harriston) exposure and competition at the international level: "It was a super experience to be part of it", he adds.
Another "super experience" which he has enjoyed with the sport was the season, which he spent playing in Canberra, Australia, in 1998. That trek, another life adventure, took him away from Ontario and his other sports love - - hockey - - for a season. He is making up for that this winter, playing with his local hockey program in an active season, which sees him on the ice (as a defenseman where he can "hit people") in a pair of games each weekend.
This was not the first ISC-II experience for the unassuming right-handed pitcher. Always a pitcher in his years with the sport, he was on the mound staff in 2002 with the Hallman Twins Juniors who made it into the playoffs in Kitchener-Waterloo.
And the exposure to the game of fastball came very early in life for the native of tiny Belmore, Ontario (population 100), "I was probably only five years old when I started playing the game. My dad had played, so he got me throwing the ball. It was something that everybody my age was doing in the summer time," he readily admits.
In "real life", the 27-year-old bachelor is employed in the sales department of Listowel Technical, a manufacturer of plastic auto parts for Honda. He has a degree in Sports Administration from Durham College in Oshawa, Ontario, which he links to his interest in the world of business.
A drive to excel, a thirst for competition and challenges, and a full life - - - that describes Scott Smith, a genuine Star of the ISC!
Dec. 31, 2003
By: Scott Lambert, ISC Special Correspondent
Gordon Wise
ISC Information Officer
Mailto:sgwise@woh.rr.com
http://www.iscfastpitch.com/