{"id":30987,"date":"2017-05-15T11:51:45","date_gmt":"2017-05-15T18:51:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.fastpitchwest.com\/?p=30987"},"modified":"2017-05-15T11:52:36","modified_gmt":"2017-05-15T18:52:36","slug":"jeff-ellsworth-is-new-hitting-coach-for-spanish-womens-national-team","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.fastpitchwest.com\/?p=30987","title":{"rendered":"Jeff Ellsworth is new hitting coach for Spanish women’s national team"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>
Flag from Wikimedia Commons<\/figcaption><\/figure>
\nFrom CBC News<\/a>
\n
\nFirst meeting with team intimidating but fulfilling<\/strong><\/p>\n

By Jordan Gill, CBC News <\/em><\/p>\n

Retirement hasn’t meant a lot of downtime for Jeff Ellsworth.<\/p>\n

Although he recently retired from Canada’s senior men’s softball team, he hasn’t left the game. He actually has a new job.<\/p>\n

Ellsworth is the new hitting coach for Spain’s national women’s softball team.<\/p>\n

Ellsworth was introduced to the team by a friend, who is also the team’s pitching coach.<\/p>\n

“He sent me a message one day, just to see if I’d be interested in coming down and working with the girls for a week,” said Ellsworth.<\/p>\n

“[After the week] as I was leaving they asked if I would want to be the hitting coach for the next few years…I accepted the position.”<\/p>\n

Ellsworth said he already enjoys working with the team and sees a lot of potential in the players. But the first day was a little intimidating.<\/p>\n

“It’s a new part of the world that I’ve never been in, going to meet a team [where] obviously there’s a language barrier,” said Ellsworth.<\/p>\n

While Ellsworth will periodically travel to Spain to work in person, right now he is mainly studying tape, conducting coaching sessions over Skype and sending a hitting program to the team.<\/p>\n

Ellsworth said the team hopes to finish in the top five at the Euro Cup, a softball tournament being held this year in Italy. Ellsworth thinks they have the potential to make the Olympics by 2024.<\/p>\n

“They’re very realistic with their goal setting,” said Ellsworth.<\/p>\n

Still loves the game<\/strong><\/p>\n

Ellsworth’s new Spanish occupation doesn’t mean he has abandoned Canada or the Island. He’s still the coach for the Canada Games women’s team from PEI and the national junior men’s team.<\/p>\n

He may be retired from playing, but that doesn’t mean he can’t hit the field occasionally.<\/p>\n

“I just got back from Cancun last week\u2026[I] played in a 16-team tournament,” said Ellsworth.<\/p>\n

Click here to continue reading and to view photos at CBS News<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

From CBC News First meeting with team intimidating but fulfilling By Jordan Gill, CBC News Retirement hasn’t meant a lot of downtime for Jeff Ellsworth. Although he recently retired from Canada’s senior men’s softball team, he hasn’t left the game. He actually has a new job. Ellsworth is the new hitting coach for Spain’s national […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":30988,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[5,28,60,26],"tags":[388,694,695],"class_list":{"0":"post-30987","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-canada","8":"category-featured","9":"category-inmemoriam","10":"category-women","11":"tag-jeffellsworth","12":"tag-legendteaching","13":"tag-spanishnationalteam","14":"entry"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fastpitchwest.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30987","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fastpitchwest.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fastpitchwest.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fastpitchwest.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fastpitchwest.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=30987"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.fastpitchwest.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30987\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":30989,"href":"https:\/\/www.fastpitchwest.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30987\/revisions\/30989"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fastpitchwest.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/30988"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fastpitchwest.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=30987"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fastpitchwest.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=30987"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fastpitchwest.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=30987"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}