means A bat-and-ball game related to baseball, played with a larger, lower-bounce ball pitched underhand on a smaller diamond — and, figuratively, an easy question or task lobbed up to be effortlessly knocked down.

from A transparent American compound of plain old 'soft' and 'ball,' coined late in the 19th century when the game began indoors as a tamer cousin of baseball, originally played with a genuinely softer ball. It went by many names first — 'indoor baseball,' 'kitten ball,' 'mush ball,' 'diamond ball' — before 'softball' won out in the 1920s. The figurative 'softball question,' an easy pitch you can hit out of the park, follows naturally from the sport's gentler underhand toss.