Dexter softball faced Ann Arbor Huron. Though it was the day after the frigid cold tennis match, it was actually a pleasant sunny spring day nearly perfect for softball. In other words, if the month of April in Michigan were a person, it would require psychiatric treatment.
Oh, but before the pictures, I have to rant as a photographer…
Hey softball jersey designers: why do you delight in putting only one number on jerseys, that being the number on the back? Other sports make a habit of putting the numbers in more than one location on the jersey, thereby ensuring that the players’ numbers are almost always visible. But your jerseys? No, all too often they have the numbers only on the back, thereby forcing me to make an extra effort to ensure I can identify the players in my photos because I seldom shoot worthwhile action photos from behind the players. Do the right thing, jersey designers, and make an effort to put the numbers in more than one location on the jerseys.
And now that I have that off my chest…here are the photos.
Home runs get the whole team involved:
Boo, what is that thing the infielder is wearing in several pictures? Is that extra protection like when Stuart broke his jaw and wore something like that for a while when he came back to hockey? Just curious.
That’s a face mask, and it’s purely the player’s preference; some prefer to play with the protection of the mask, while others prefer to play without it. It’s not necessarily connected to a recent injury (though it can be).
There’s no predicting how many masks you’ll see on the field; there are usually maybe just one or two players wearing masks, but I’ve seen teams with the entire infield wearing them, and I’ve seen teams without a single mask on the field.