26 March 2025
The ADF Diamond Sports baseball team hit it out of the park to emerge undefeated at the Australian Federal Police Baseball Championships in Canberra, from March 17-18.
The mixed-gender side beat two police teams - an Australian foreign law enforcement contingent side and a civilian team from Deloitte.
For Leading Aircraftwoman Madison Tough, the highlight was hitting a triple in one of the Deloitte games.
“It was against Robbie Perkins, who is an Australian baseballer,” she said.
“Although he's a catcher, he still throws the ball pretty hard. So that was definitely a challenging game for us. It was a close game but we won by one run.”
The highlight for Army Sergeant Brett Ardill was pitching.
“It was good pitching to those guys because they play for Australia and have played professionally overseas,” he said.
The championships were an invitational tournament. It was the first outing for the team since baseball was recently recognised as a level-four ADF sport.
“It’s good baseball is now recognised by the ADF. I've played a couple of times with softball over my career, but baseball is my main sport,” Sergeant Ardill said.
Chief Petty Officer Daniel Conway-Jones’ strategy was to pitch as hard as he could.
“Mainly fastball, but I like to throw siders as well,” he said.
“Each team only had a couple of really good high-performing players. Once we got ahead we took it easy.
“The big part of this competition was engaging and talking to the other teams. We weren’t there to just win, we surprised them with how much sportsmanship we displayed.”
The ADF Diamond Sports Association incorporates ADF Softball.
