{"id":31032,"date":"2017-05-26T13:51:43","date_gmt":"2017-05-26T20:51:43","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.fastpitchwest.com\/?p=31032"},"modified":"2017-05-26T13:51:43","modified_gmt":"2017-05-26T20:51:43","slug":"ex-softballer-breaks-50-year-family-legacy-to-play-baseball-in-united-states","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.fastpitchwest.com\/?p=31032","title":{"rendered":"Ex-softballer breaks 50-year family legacy to play baseball in United States"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>From Auckland Now (www.stuff.co.nz)<\/p>\n<div class=\"story_content_top mbm cf\">\n<div class=\"story__byline-wrapper story__byline-wrapper__social cf\">\n<div class=\"social social--desktop\">\n<div class=\"social__bar-container\">\n<div class=\"story__byline-block social__story-content u-f-left\">\n<p class=\"story__byline\"><em>BY SAM HEWAT<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div id=\"93027272\" class=\"landscapephoto\">\n<div class=\"photocaption\">\n<p><strong>Joseph Kohlhase<\/strong>, 19, has made the switch from softball to baseball and will head to the United States with the hope of playing in the Major Leagues.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"hdivider\">Two years ago, you could have\u00a0almost bet your house on Aucklander Joseph Kohlhase playing softball for New Zealand.<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p>The family name was strongly associated with the sport&#8217;s history.<\/p>\n<p>Father\u00a0Eddie\u00a0was one of the most decorated in the sport, winning four world championships with the Black Sox &#8211;\u00a0coaching the national side from 2004 to 2013. Uncle Chris was also a Black Sox member as was grandfather Eric who made the team in 1968.<\/p>\n<p>The family legacy was set to continue when Joseph picked up softball at age five, however, the 19-year-old former St Peters College student has\u00a0decided to switch codes.States next week to play baseball for\u00a0Fort Collins\u00a0in Colorado. He&#8217;ll spend two months there before moving to San Francisco where he&#8217;ll play at a\u00a0junior college &#8211; San Mateo.<\/p>\n<p>It is an extraordinary feat given Kohlhase has only started taking\u00a0baseball seriously in the last 12 months. The fact he&#8217;s made the transition from softball &#8211; a sport\u00a0he played for 14 years &#8211; is also impressive.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.stuff.co.nz\/auckland\/sport\/93024725\/exsoftballer-breaks-50year-family-legacy-to-play-baseball-in-united-states\">Click here to read the rest of the story and view photo at Auckland Now.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>From Auckland Now (www.stuff.co.nz) BY SAM HEWAT Joseph Kohlhase, 19, has made the switch from softball to baseball and will head to the United States with the hope of playing in the Major Leagues. Two years ago, you could have\u00a0almost bet your house on Aucklander Joseph Kohlhase playing softball for New Zealand. The family name [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"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":[28,35,19],"tags":[653,711],"class_list":{"0":"post-31032","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-featured","7":"category-oceania","8":"category-players","9":"tag-aucklandfastball","10":"tag-nzfastball","11":"entry"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fastpitchwest.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31032","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=31032"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.fastpitchwest.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31032\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":31033,"href":"https:\/\/www.fastpitchwest.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31032\/revisions\/31033"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fastpitchwest.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=31032"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fastpitchwest.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=31032"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fastpitchwest.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=31032"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}