The 2010 Big 10 Conference softball All-Star team has created a decent amount of controversy, at least among anonymous internet comment-makers.

Big 10 softball chairman Jerry Dagostino, Notre Dame-Bishop Gibbons' head coach, was kind enough to reply with the exact methods by which the team is chosen.

The league's head coaches all get together and first discuss the players in particular that they feel should be recognized.

Then, the coaches rank their top 10 players - excluding their own - and assign point values in descending order. Thus, their top player gets 10 points and the next best gets nine and so on. The player with the most points becomes MVP and the next nine make up the first team.

Others receiving more than one vote are listed as honorable mention selections.

Coaches in the Big 10 have used this system for over 15 years. They have decided not to go by positions because positions such as shortstop, catcher and pitcher tend to be loaded. More often than not, those are the players that deserve to be recognized, so it makes more sense to leave positions open than forcefully put a left fielder, for example, on the team that may not have had an All-Star caliber season.

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I hope that puts the conspiracy theories to rest.

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