DATE: Thursday, July 17, 1997               TAG: 9707170692
SECTION: SPORTS                  PAGE: C1   EDITION: FINAL 

SOURCE: TOM ROBINSON

DATELINE: HAMPTON                           LENGTH:   72 lines

AT LAST, A WELL-DESERVED NIGHT OFF FOR ROADSTERS

A night off.

After nearly two months, Michelle Carlson-Neveling and Ali Franzen have been play-for-pay athletes long enough to grasp the sublime appeal of that concept. Because frankly, they're a little whipped right now, not physically so much as mentally in the wake of 41 pro fast-pitch softball games since May 30, with 31 to go.

They are members of the Virginia Roadsters, the cleverly named women's team that has brought some life back to old War Memorial Stadium, and their engines are cranking a bit lower these days.

Which is why neither was really moping around Wednesday night when their series finale against the Tampa Bay FireStix was called off because of rain. Eager as they are to hit the field and start reversing their poor second-half start - the Roadsters are sputtering along at 0-5 after an 18-18 first half - their brains could use a rest.

``The travel gets to me, but physically I feel good,'' says Carlson-Neveling, the 25-year-old third baseman who is second on the team with a .315 batting average and leads with 18 RBIs. ``Mentally, though, it's tough to get over a bad day sometimes.''

Franzen, 21, is the pitcher, straight out of the College of St. Francis (Ill.) who is putting workhorses everywhere to shame, not that she's bragging about it. Because of a thin staff, coach Lynn O'Linski is running Franzen out there for at least part of most every game - 27 of the 41 so far.

That's allowed Franzen to pile up a whopping 170 1/3 innings to date, which combined with the couple hundred she worked in college has made her one weary pup. ``It's by far the most innings I've ever thrown to only be halfway through the season,'' says Franzen, who has a 10-13 record and a 1.85 ERA.

Do not, however, get the idea that they are complaining. Far from it. Sure, if you ask, they can give you all the stories those male minor leaguers have always told about 15-hour bus rides, the loneliness and boredom of the road, the tedium of a hot, trying season, the fast-food diets and pangs for home.

Sit and talk with Carlson-Neveling and Franzen, though, and what you get most is a steady stream of sincerity, complemented by obvious appreciation for where they are and what they are doing.

Better, you understand they actually feel honored to be part of this whole thing, this six-team Women's Professional Fastpitch circuit that's trying to make a go of it.

It is a cleansing freshness, really, amid such stale prattle that dominates our pro sports these days.

Funny, but that was why the United States' women's softball team that won the gold medal at last summer's Atlanta Olympics was such a phenomenon and a sold-out success.

The games were love-ins, requited affairs where Dot Richardson, Lisa Fernandez and the other ladies fed off and returned the unabashed adoration of their fans, of each sex and all ages, to beat the world.

Even if the caliber of play is much less in the WPF, the Roadsters say the attitude has carried over.

While the players think the WPF has tinkered with the game to its detriment - lengthening by a few feet the distance between the bases and from the pitcher's rubber to home plate - the constancy of support from the stands alone, they say, has made the season special.

Standing ovations after home losses, and at 8-15 the Roadsters have the worst home record in the league? They happen all the time. ``It literally gives me chills,'' Franzen says.

So, too, do the encouraging words, recognition and autograph requests rained upon the players from men, women and children, all the things that make off nights go down a little easier.

``I've never been in a store before where someone said, `Hey, don't you play third base for the Roadsters?' '' Carlson-Neveling says. ``When you go out, it makes you care about what you look like a little more. You carry yourself as a professional.''

So maybe they appreciate the occasional rainout. That doesn't dull your sense that the Roadsters are going to miss this horribly when the summer's done.

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