People think you were like born out of the womb as this amazing athlete all of a sudden and it's like I learned to pitch and I was very average for a long time and then everything clicked.

Welcome to the Just Woman Sports Podcast, where we talk to the biggest athletes in the world about the untold stories behind their success.

I'm Kelly O'Hara, and my guest today is Cat Osterman.

Cat Osterman is the most dominant pitcher

in the history of softball.

At the University of Texas,

Cat became the only player to win three USA Softball

collegiate Player of the Year Awards.

In 2004, she led the team USA with 23 strikeouts during their gold medal run at the Athens Olympics.

She again helped the team take home silver in Beijing.

A four-time national pro fast-pitched champion Kat came out of retirement in Beijing. A four-time national pro fast-pitched champion, Kat came out of retirement in 2017 in hopes to help

Team USA win gold at the now 2021 Tokyo Olympics.

Kat, welcome to the show.

Thanks for having me.

I'm excited to talk to you today and we're just going to start off going back to where it all started for you,

back to the beginning. You were born and raised in Houston, Texas.

What was your early childhood like and how would you say you were first introduced to sports in general?

I played sports as soon as I think I could walk. you were first introduced to sports in general.

I played sports as soon as I think I could walk and hold balls and kick balls and everything else.

So grew up in a family that loves basketball. My dad's from southern Illinois and so football wasn't really

something we had on the TV when I was growing up but as soon as I was capable of

playing sports I was in I was in sports.

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