Beyer Stadium Investment, Alex Hugo Reviewing the Draft Pool, and More WPBL News
Plus: Kelsie Whitmore at Petco Park, Ashton Lansdell at Kauffman Stadium, and Allie Bebbere & Molly Paddison join the Inside Pitch podcast
Every week (or so) I publish a fresh WPBL News Rundown, a collection of all the most notable and interesting stories on women’s pro baseball I’ve read since the last post.
Our official Women’s Pro Baseball League hats arrived in the mail yesterday. It took a few extra weeks after the t-shirts arrived, but my wardrobe is now complete! I can’t wait to wear it around town. But first, let’s dig into the latest WPBL news:
The New York Mets owners are stepping up to the plate with a major investment in women’s sports and the city of Rockford, Illinois. The International Women’s Baseball Center received $2.35 million in grants from the Steven & Alexandra Cohen Foundation and the Amazin’ Mets Foundation to help expedite the first phase of renovation and restoration efforts for Beyer Stadium, former home of the Rockford Peaches of the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League. It was also announced that the park surrounding Beyer Stadium would be renamed after IWBC founding director emeritus and WPBL honorary advisory board chair Maybelle Blair. You can read the full statement from the non-profit here.
The IWBC will host next year’s Women’s Baseball World Cup group stage. It appears as though the games are scheduled to take place at the home of the Rockford Rivets of the Northwoods League, though I wonder if this influx of money and accelerated construction changes any of those plans. Regardless of where the games are played, the IWBC promises “community activations” at historic Beyer Stadium. For those of you in the Midwest who are unable to travel to the Northeast to see the WPBL inaugural season, many of the league’s stars will also be playing in the World Cup in Illinois from July 22nd to the 26th, 2026. The AAGPBL reunion is also that same week – be sure to mark your calendars.
Even casual baseball fans are familiar with Steve Cohen’s massive net worth, but $2 million is nothing to sneeze at, and I’m excited to see the International Women’s Baseball Center secure more funding for what sounds like a really cool project. Hopefully, the donations keep coming in as the entire Maybelle Blair Park renovation will cost more than $25 million. This is purely speculation on my part, but assuming the WPBL is successful out of the gate and looks to expand to the rest of the country in the future, could we see a team in Rockford? I’m sure everyone involved would be on board and it sounds like they’ll have a pretty impressive facility soon. A WPBL team two hours from my house would be a dream.
WPBL adviser Alex Hugo recently spoke with Kamila Hinkson at The Athletic about next steps for the new league. According to the article, the league plans to launch with at least four teams at minimum – a new development, as it’s been previously reported that number is six. There’s a chance the inaugural draft happens in early November instead of October. Hinkson also shares a bit more about player compensation: “$500 per game plus travel, accommodations, meals and a percentage of league sponsorship revenue.”
Hugo says she is still reviewing the notes from last month’s league tryouts. It sounds like the talent evaluators are ranking all the players in preparation for the draft – which, I’m guessing, may eventually populate the prospect ranking webpage I mentioned in last week’s rundown. Whether this ranking will serve just as a tool for teams to use or literally act as the draft order, I’m not sure. More from Hugo:
There are some players that weren’t able to attend the tryout who gave us some video submissions or we have seen them play in a tournament, international play, stuff like that. We’re going through scouting reports and different notes to make sure that we order the draft correctly. That’s my mission, to make sure that the players are ordered based on talent, so that these teams are going to be solid.
The interview features a few other nuggets I enjoyed, including why a decorated player like Alex Hugo isn’t in the draft pool herself, details on what they were looking for during the tryouts, why she likes the idea of a shorter season, and more. You can read Hinkson’s full article here1.
Thanks in part to their involvement in the Banana Ball World Tour, future WPBL draftees Kelsie Whitmore and Ashton Lansdell are no stranger to playing in MLB stadiums. Yet the last few weeks have featured notable steps in their baseball journeys. Whitmore fulfilled a lifelong dream of pitching at Petco Park (while also collecting her first Banana Ball strikeout). Meanwhile Home Run Derby X, a rousing co-ed baseball event Lansdell has been involved with since the beginning, took place at an MLB stadium for the first time in its four year history.
Lansdell also caught up with Michael Clair of MLB.com2 at the Kansas City HRDX event to talk about WPBL tryouts and meeting new players from all around the world.
My favorite podcast I’ve listened to this week is the most recent episode of Women’s Baseball - The Inside Pitch. Host Amy McCann interviews Allie Bebbere and Molly Paddison, two Australian baseball players who traveled to the WPBL tryouts in Washington, D.C. and made it through to the draft pool. The entire hour is spent sharing each moment of Bebbere and Paddison’s trials experience. They discuss the decision to try out in person, the specific kinds of drills they were put through, making it to Nationals Park, and the impact of the experience once they returned home. It’s the longest podcast I’ve recommended in this space so far but it’s also one of the most fun and detailed accounts of the tryouts I’ve heard or read. Take a listen below:
Alex Hugo’s interview with The Athletic is behind a paywall, if you’re not subscribed. Personally I’ve enjoyed reading the site for the last year and a half – here’s hoping the recent WPBL coverage continues. If you’re looking for more women’s sports coverage, I particularly enjoy Sabreena Merchant and Ben Pickman’s writing about the WNBA. (Maybe I should research how affiliate links work before I say more nice things. 🤣)
While I’m recommending writers I enjoy, I’ll also throw a shoutout to Michael Clair. I loved reading his baseball blog 10-15 years ago and now he writes a ton of great stuff as a reporter for MLB.com. A lot of Clair’s beat involves the international side of the game, including coverage of the Women’s Baseball World Cup.