On the Record with Tom Crouch
By KATRINA J.E. MILTON
DeKALB – Tom Crouch of DeKalb will have a busy summer. He plans to visit many different cities, including San Francisco, Las Vegas, Orlando, Toronto, Pennsylvania and New York. Nearly every weekend this summer, he will travel to a different destination.
Crouch isn’t going on vacation, he is traveling with a professional men’s national softpitch softball team based in Green Bay, Wisconsin.
Crouch has played in the Pan American Games and in the World Cup of Softball, traveled to Haiti, Mexico, New Zealand and the Dominican Republic to play on teams and has competed on the USA Men’s National Fastpitch Softball Team from 2011 to 2013.
Before his regular fastpitch softball season starts, Crouch has been playing shortstop for the local men’s fastpitch softball team, the DeKalb Hustlehogs.
This weekend, the Hustlehogs will host a men’s fastpitch softball tournament, the NAFA Super Regional, at Katz Park, 393 W. Dresser Road in DeKalb. Games begin at 6:45 p.m. Friday, continue with games at 10 a.m., 11:45 a.m., 3:15 p.m., 5 p.m. and 6:45 p.m. Saturday and 10:45 a.m. and 12:30 p.m. Sunday. The championship game will be at 2:15 p.m. Sunday. The tournament is free and open to the public.
The tournament will have five teams from Wisconsin, Kansas and Illinois with world-class players from nine different countries.
Crouch met with MidWeek reporter Katrina Milton while practicing with teammate Fabio Silverstre of Argentina to discuss the sport of men’s fastpitch softball and the upcoming tournament.