Comments

1
Thank you for this. I was thinking all of these things while I was reading the article and almost commented to that effect, but I wasn't sure I'd be able to articulate my disdain. That article was ridiculous.
3
And the fairytale story ends with her retiring to be a good housewife and mother and there was never a problem heard again. Good thing she didn't get a wild hair to do what she wants with her life!
4
didja see that when you click the zoom on her photo you get the option of voting here hot or not?
5
Comparing athlete from different sports seems the ultimate apples vs. oranges debate, but let me ask something to those who are pushing the gender issue:

Would you be ok with integrating/desegregating sports? If all professional sports were mixed-gender, and there weren't men's and women's leagues, would that be a positive change? If not, why?

I suspect the answer is that if men and women were both competing on an even playing field, a lot of women would get completely shut out of professional sports, which nobody wants. But if that's the case, doesn't that automatically admit that the women are competing at a lower standard of competition than the men?
6
Like @4 said, when you zoom the photo, it takes you to a section of Seattle's sexiest female sports personal….
UW softball pitcher extraordinaire can’t decide whether she wants to be a blonde or brunette and, frankly, it doesn’t matter – Lawrie looks terrific on the mound in more ways than one.
7
Commandant: Let's go over this one more time, just to make sure I understand the situation. [clears throat] You're a girl.

Lisa: Yes.

Commandant: Oh, gosh darn it, I just don't understand the situation. [clears throat again] You're a girl?
8
To answer your question... Yes. I remember back when I was playing high school softball in the Midwest. We had a similar freakishly talented pitcher who pitched the regular-mound equivalent of 94 mph. A sports reporter (I think from the Chicago Tribune?) came down to write a feature on her where he would go to bat against her.... the whole article was basically predicated on how crazy it was that a man (a man!!) could not get a hit off her. I was 15 and still recognized how idiotic the article was.

P.S. Wow, I just read the caption of the picture in the article and it appears that sportswriters actually did the exact same thing with Lawrie (OMG! How funny is it that she's striking us out!).
9
Hell, I completely get that women and men have different physical builds, different strengths and weaknesses and therefore most women would likely be at a disadvantage playing men's games with men. But the context here is "women's softball", and the point is that she plays extremely well according to the standards of that particular sport.
10
Danielle Lawrie gets plenty of respect from local sports writers. Jerry Brewer at the Seattle Times did a great article on her Wednesday:

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/je…

I think the guy in this article is an AP writer. I watched a few of the championship games myself on TV last year and was very impressed. Its hard to compare sports, but she probably is the best athlete from UW so far - certainly the most dominating in her sport.
11
Elena Myers! Look! I'm a female girl too who is not a dude and not only that I have a vagina in my lady bits and that makes me a woman. Also... chick! Wowie kazowie.
12
How is The Stranger going to try and criticize the Seattle Times here? What stories have you done about the phenomenal Lawrie? Zilch. An amazing athlete in your backyard and you just ignore her, like she is of no importance? Its easy to just attack attack attack, but this is just the Stranger being left in the dust and doing a lazy job. Lazy Lazy Lazy.
13
This whole "baseball equivalent" thing is stupid, and really just another way of minimizing her accomplishments by comparing what she has done to a "real" sport. And from a nitpicky physics perspective, whether you can throw a ball 71mph or 97mph is independent of the distance from home plate. If you pitch a softball from 60 feet it is still going 71mph, it just takes longer to get there. Therefore the real difference is in the hitter's perspective/reaction time, not some magical situation where if you had the softball pitcher throw from a baseball mound they would suddenly be able to throw it 97mph. It's like saying I could be an awesome baseball pitcher, if only the mound was 20 feet from homeplate. Does the author of the AP article even get that distinction?
14
This post says a lot more about Ms. Madrid's own, unexamined biases than those of the writer.

It's perfectly reasonable to discuss the fact that in the long history of UW sports -- during most of which women had little to no opportunities to compete -- that the most dominant athlete ever is a woman. There's nothing patronizing or sexist about it -- unless you want there to be.

Now, the fact that the P-I linked the photo to its own discussion of the sexiest female athletes should be an embarrassment to the P-I. But that is no reflection on the AP reporter who wrote the story.
15
@5, no one except anti-feminists ever brings in the "shall we gender-desegregate sports then, since men and women are so equal" angle. Feminists just want women's sports to be treated like sports, not like lingerie football.
16
@6: SERIOUSLY?! I thought 4 was joking.

I'm sure as hell not gonna give them another page view, though.

What the fuck, man? Seriously. What the fucking fuck?
17
How dare someone disrespect The Lawrie. She is iconic.
18
@5 A lower standard of competition? And you determine what the ultimate standard is how?
19
@13, the whole "baseball equivalent" thing is extremely relevant, especially for your average sports fan. A sports fan hears 71 mph and thinks "what's the big deal?". In Pony leagues (13-14yo boys), a typical good pitcher throws around 71. They hear "equivalent to 97" and it drives home how fast DL is really throwing.

As you point out, it's related to the distance, so what's really equivalent is the time from the pitcher's hand to home plate. But do we really need the author to get into a physics explanation of why they were equivalent?

You must have been toilet trained at gunpoint, because your post couldn't be more anal retentive.
20
everyone should really read the comments section on that article if you want to see some real sexist bullshit.

"Suppose she was totally the best . . . dart player . . . anyone could ever remember, setting all the records. Would anyone care? Where do you draw the line? I draw it here; girls don't count. The best athlete of all time is the warrior, Marques Tuiasosopo. 500 yards. Injured. You just can't put softball in front of that, it wouldn't be fair."

"Football and men's hoops are the only sports people care about for college for more than a week of a year, so like it or not the "best husky of all time" has to come from one of those. Otherwise we have to add the crew people, women's volleyball, and god knows what else. "

"Many times the college females are playing softball at the same time next door to the men's field so I will wander over once in a while. They play like women. Nothing wrong with that until some loon tries to compare them to men."

neat.
21
Danielle is the best
22
@20 I've always found people who say shit like that to be out of shape, unathletic fuck faces. I remember getting into an argument with some fat, redneck asshole at a bar over Title IX. He obviously put a high value on tiny moment of glory 20 years ago as football was much more important than funding any women's sports. During the argument he asked me who won the Boston Marathon. Since men and women don't compete against each other in that race, I had no idea what he was talking about. "A man." was his answer. I then proceeded to tell him that I could beat his ass in a race easily, right now, while drunk, so obviously I was a superior human being to him. "See how easy disenfranchisement and dehumanizing people is, asshole?"
23
Sports just is, I think if people want to play with the "other" sex, and have sports be more about being human than whatever dangling between your legs more power to you. However I think some sports, like football, are probably best not played by women. I mostly have this belief because I don't think men should be playing unless they prefer their brain matter smashed into tiny little pieces. To each his own for sure, it's not going to make me want to watch the same thing over and over and over again, rooting for people making more than I will ever in my lifetime, but if it makes the communists happy I say do it.

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