Of all the players on baseball and softball fields, I respect catchers the most. They are the ones sitting in an uncomfortable crouch for half the game while wearing pads, helmets and shin guards limiting their range of motion.

Catchers are the ones doing all the little stuff no one notices. The catcher positions the infielders so when a line drive comes their way, they just have to lift up their glove to get the out. Not many people notice that sort of thing. They will say, “Wow they get into perfect position.” No, the catcher got them into perfect position.

At Eastern there is an interesting contrast between the baseball team’s catcher, Bret Pignatiello, and the softball team’s catcher, Kristin Darnell. For starters, there is a bit of a height difference between the two. Pignatiello stands over six feet tall, while Darnell is barely over five feet at 5-foot-2 inches.

They are also different types of players. Pignatiello is a power hitter. He led the team in home runs last season and leads again this year. He has a good chance of setting school records for homeruns in a single season and in a career. Darnell on the other hand is a contact hitter. She bats leadoff for the Panthers, which is odd for a catcher, a position associated with bad knees and even worse speed.

They both go about their daily grind helping their team in their own particular way, but in last Wednesday’s win against Southeast Missouri State University, Darnell helped the Panthers in a slightly different way than usual.

In the fourth inning of the second game of the double header, Darnell hit the first homerun of her life. Not her college career, not her high school career, her life.

When she hit the homerun, she ran around the bases jumping up and down like Bobby Thompson after hit the homerun against the Dodgers to clench the pennant in 1951. The home run was not that important to the game. It was a solo home run in the bottom of the fourth with SEMO leading 7-4. The homerun didn’t tie the game, it just brought them one run closer, so Darnell’s celebration puzzled me until I looked in the media guide and found she had not hit a homerun in her entire career.

After the game I interviewed head coach Lloydene Searle and she told me it was the first in Darnell’s life and that her only goal this season was to hit a homerun.

“I told (Darnell) now you have to get a new goal,” Searle said.

Darnell doesn’t have many options for new personal goals. She has played in nearly every game Eastern has played in her four years in Charleston. She is one of the best players on the team and she does a great job of handling Eastern’s pitchers.

Darnell should be able to look back proudly on her accomplishments. She might not have the impressive stats Pignatiello has, but she has done her job well. When she graduates next at the end of the season, she will leave some big shoes to fill, despite her small stature.