Bickering Throws a Curve at Gender Ballgame : Thousand Oaks: Disagreement over key issues cancels match between championship boys’ and girls’ teams.

Much like the baseball season itself, a proposal to pit championship Conejo Valley ball teams in a gender grudge match has struck out because of bickering over key issues, organizers said Thursday.

Thirteen-year-old boys on the Thousand Oaks Junior League team wanted to play baseball. But their 12- to 15-year-old opponents on a Newbury Park girls softball team insisted that a softball be used, said Joseph Joyce, president of the girl’s Bobby Sox Softball League.

“In baseball, a hardball is used and it travels faster than a softball,” Joyce said. “Our girls aren’t used to that.”

The boys had their own concerns, said Brian Angel, a Westlake Village radio station producer who helped hype the boys versus girls skirmish.

“The boys have no experience hitting a ball thrown by an underhand pitcher,” Angel said. “And the boys could hurt their arms throwing a softball. It involves a completely different weight distribution.”

Finally, the question of who would pay for such necessities as insurance left players backing away from the faceoff faster than a line drive to third.

Although the game is off, the spate of media attention given the match has raised the public’s awareness of inequities in the way boys and girls sports are covered, said Stacie Beshore, a star pitcher on the softball team.

“I hope this will make some people realize that girls can play sports just as well as boys,” said Stacie, 15, a sophomore at Newbury Park High School. “But I think it will take a long time for things to be equal.”

The challenge by softball catcher Amanda Marino to take on the boys’ team came after the girls won a national title for the third consecutive year.

Coverage of the girls’ victory was scant contrasted with the flurry of news stories written about the boys as they advanced toward victory in their Junior League World Series.

Amanda, like other softball players and their parents, was so peeved by the disparity that she challenged the boys to a game.

“We’d beat them because we’re tougher,” Amanda proclaimed.

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Those words split Conejo Valley sports fans along gender lines, as talk began circulating about a possible battle of the sexes. But when radio producer Angel had the presidents of both leagues on his show to discuss the competition, it was agreed the decision would be left up to the players.

And that’s when the idea died, Joyce said.

“The girls wanted to play a game for fun,” he said. “When it looked like it was turning into a grudge match, they decided to call it off.”

Angel and others, however, agreed that the girls’ team is receiving more recognition for their athletic ability as a result of the proposed faceoff.

“They’ve been national champions three times in a row,” Angel said. “And who knew about them until this year?”

Besides being featured in several news articles about the possible game, the girls will receive recognition for the first time by the Conejo Valley Unified School District, Joyce said.

And on Sept. 27, the softball team will be honored by the Thousand Oaks City Council, Joyce said. Councilman Frank Schillo is arranging a pep rally to start at 4 p.m. at Borchard Park in Newbury Park.

Following the rally, the girls will be driven in limousines to the council’s new chambers in the Civic Arts Plaza for an awards ceremony, Schillo said.

“They have done an astounding job,” he said. “They are national champions and they deserve the recognition.”