MLB invests in Athletes Unlimited
Softball League ahead of June debut
[May 30, 2025]
By CLIFF BRUNT
Major League Baseball is investing in Athletes Unlimited to support
its softball league that will debut next month, its first
comprehensive partnership with a professional women’s sports
circuit.
MLB said Thursday it was making a strategic investment in the
Athletes Unlimited Softball League of an undisclosed amount for
operational costs and a commitment to help it gain visibility. MLB
will assist with content, marketing and sales, events, distribution,
editorial, and digital and social platforms.
Support will include marketing the AUSL and its athletes during
MLB's All-Star Game and throughout the postseason along with
broadcasts on the MLB Network and streams on MLB.TV.
“This is something we’re really excited about,” MLB commissioner Rob
Manfred told The Associated Press. “We studied the space hard. We
think it’s a real opportunity and we’re excited to be involved.”
Athletes Unlimited has featured softball since 2020, when it
unveiled a unique format that crowned an individual champion. The
company will launch a four-team league starting June 7 with the
Bandits and Talons opening with a three-game series in Rosemont,
Illinois, and the Blaze and Volts a three-game set at Wichita,
Kansas. The four teams will play 24 games each, touring to 12
cities, and the top two teams will compete in the best-of-three AUSL
Championship from July 26-28 in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. A 21-game AUSL
All-Star Cup will follow in August.
A traditional city-based league will start in 2026, when the AUSL
plans to expand to six teams, according to AU co-founder Jon
Patricof.
“This is really something that is going to be sustainable and people
can be professional softball players and that is all they do,” U.S.
national team infielder Sis Bates said. “This can be your full-time
career, which is incredible.”
Manfred said MLB considered launching its own softball league.
“We thought rather than starting on our own and competing, that
finding a place where we could invest and grow a business was a
better opportunity,” Manfred said.
Former Miami Marlins general manager and MLB senior vice president
Kim Ng joined AUSL as an adviser and was promoted to commissioner in
April.
MLB's involvement could drive softball toward advanced analytics in
the same manner as it has in baseball.
“TrackMan is in some of the stadiums that we’re going to be in,” she
said, referring to the radar system behind MLB Statcast. “We've
signed on with a number of different analytics groups.”
MLB was encouraged by growth of the WNBA, National Women's Soccer
League and NCAA women's basketball. MLB hasn't ruled out later
involvement in women's baseball.
'What’s really exciting about this is us committing not just a
financial investment but resources and our time and sort of the
power that is MLB," MLB chief marketing officer Uzma Rawn Dowler
said.
[to top of second column] |
Major League Baseball Youth Softball Ambassador Jennie Finch is
interviewed at MLB's headquarters in New York, Thursday, May 29,
2025. (AP Photo/Richard Drew)
Patricof said MLB’s assistance to boost the AUSL’s
visibility is as important as the financial investment.
“They’re committed to really elevating the AUSL,” he said. “It’s
probably about one of the most difficult things for any sports
league to do which is to get visibility and break through to new
audiences, and I think MLB is already doing that for the AUSL, and
there’s going to be a lot more to come.”
Women’s pro softball leagues and independent teams have come and
gone over the years. The AUSL hopes for stability and has softball
greats Cat Osterman, Jennie Finch, Jessica Mendoza and Natasha
Watley as advisers.
MLB already supports several women's softball and baseball
initiatives, including a partnership with USA Softball and operation
of the MLB Develops girls baseball pipeline. It is not involved with
the Women's Professional Baseball League, which plans to launch in
2026 as the first pro baseball league for women since the
All-American Girls Professional Baseball League — of "A League of
Their Own" fame — folded in 1954.
“I think it's more long-term thing,” MLB chief development officer
Tony Reagins said of women's baseball. "The talent pool, the
infrastructure, the organizations on the softball side was ahead of
the baseball side."
Manfred sees a bright future ahead for AUSL.
“We hope that we will end up with a league that is sustainable on
its own, a good investment for us, and a partner in growing diamond
sports internationally,” he said.
Patricof said the partnership with MLB and the already existing
relationship between AU and USA Softball will combine to help give
the AUSL stability.
“As we announce MLB coming into the fold formally into what we’re
doing with the AUSL, you really see a full alignment of this sport
behind this league, and that I think is exciting for everyone,”
Patricof said. “People who have sat on the sidelines or maybe have
watched pro softball from a little bit of distance — everybody’s now
jumped in, and I think that is an exciting moment for people who’ve
been around this sport.”
___
AP Baseball Writer Ronald Blum contributed to this report.
All contents © copyright 2025 Associated Press. All rights reserved
 |
