noun

• (sports) A game similar to baseball but played with a larger and softer ball which can be thrown overhand or underhand.
  "This will give you someone with whom you can trade softball complaints, which any veteran game-goer will tell you is the key to a good time."
• (sports) The ball used to play the sport.
• (by analogy) A question designed to be easy to answer.
  "Each man got his share of softballs on Friday night. But for 90 minutes in a dressed-up basketball arena at Washington University, the two candidates were also forced to address the kind of questions they get rarely if ever on the campaign trail: from voters who doubted them and maybe did not even like them very much."