ROBSTOWN, Texas — Women's Professional Fastpitch, in it's second season, is bringing softball to South Texas through the Coastal Bend Tidal Wave at Fairgrounds Field in Robstown. While the league is unrelated to National Pro Fastpitch that folded during COVID, the WPF is building off of their legacy of growing softball.
"Here I am you know. I have an opportunity to come out or retirement and play again," Rock Benavides, Tidal Wave utility player, said. "Never would I have thought, but it's absolutely a dream come true."
Benavides, a Corpus Christi Veterans Memorial alum, was 1 of 17 women who signed to play for the Tidal Wave led by head coach Blake Miller. He coached college softball for 20 years, ending his career at Texas A&M University six years ago before coaching 12U softball..
"In the infield we just have people who are going to smash down fences," Miller said. "Along with a couple of long ball hitters. We have everything. It's been an absolute dream the way this team has come together."
At the University of Houston in 2022, Benavides started all 55 games at shorstop and was involved in 11 of 27 double plays. Over the past two years she served as a coach for Texas Twelve.
"Just the impact that I will be able to have on the youth softball world here in South Texas is going to be phenomenal," Benavides said.
Her impact on softball began a long time ago, when she played club ball with the Bombers. Just ask her teammate Cassandra Valdez.
"She was somebody that I had looked up to when I was younger because we were in the same softball organization," Valdez said. "It's honestly super cool to be playing with her."
Valdez, a Brownsville Veterans Memorial grad, dreamed three years ago of playing professional softball. This past spring at Our Lady of the Lake Universityshe won 30 games and only lost one, earning a chance to make it a reality.
"Getting a call from Coach Joe (Morabito, Tidal Wave assistant coach) was a whole whirlwind of emotions," Valdez said. "It just felt like everything that I had worked hard for was kind of coming for me."
This team in South Texas will make historic waves, but more importantly show young girls what hard work can achieve.
"There's a dream," Miller said. "It puts that dream in front of them. Instead of saying it can happen they're seeing it right in front of them."
The Tidal Wave start their inaugural season with a road trip to Lubbock against the Hub City Adelitas on June 20 for a 4-game series. Then the Wave make a splash in Robstown at Fairgrounds Field on June 27 against the Texas Smoke (San Marcos). Before playing the fourth and final team in the WPF, the Texas Monarchs (San Marcos).
Tickets at Fairgrounds Field will range from $12-$16 and will go on sale soon. Below is the 8-week season schedule. Each series is 4 games long with the Championship Series in Robstown starting Aug. 13.
In the late 60's and/or early 70's Corpus Christi had an ASA Women's Major Slow Pitch team called the Blue Jays. Here is a photo provided by Diane Schanen.
