The little town of Bremen sits in north central Indiana along U.S. Route 6.
It bears the nickname of “The Mint City,” from the German settlers who grew mint in the rich soil native to that neck of the woods.
One of these days soon, Bremen (population some 4,600) may need a second sobriquet: “The town Erin Coffel made famous.”
The favorite daughter of The Mint City has enjoyed more than a sprig of success in the inaugural Athletes Unlimited Softball League season.
Coffel is putting her name on the softball map with a breakout year. The Bandits’ second baseman was named Hitter of the Year and named to the All-Defensive Team, and finds herself in the running for Most Valuable Player. She has also helped lead the Bandits into the AUSL Championship, a best-of-three series from July 26-28 in Tuscaloosa, Alabama.
You don’t need a GPS to find Coffel’s name among the AUSL stat leaders. She enters the final game leading the league in RBIs (27), on-base percentage (.570), slugging percentage (.877), triples (4) and hit by pitches (13). She ranks third in batting average (.404). Coffel is third behind Zerkle and teammate Skylar Wallace in total bases (50).
Those numbers are even more impressive considering she went only 1-for-13 in this past weekend’s series against the Volts.
“Talk about clutch,” marveled Bandits General Manager Jenny-Dalton Hill. “She’s come in with such great at-bats. And her mentality is so even-keeled. She doesn’t get too high. She doesn’t get too low. I love the way she attacks the game, just so much confidence and breathes that confidence and exudes that confidence to her teammates all around her.”
With as much as she has accomplished, it’s hard to believe sometimes that Coffel is only a second-year pro. But she did compile an eye-popping resume at the University of Kentucky before she joined Athletes Unlimited last year, when she finished 18th on the AUX individual leaderboard and eighth in the Championship season (now the AUSL All-Star Cup).
At Kentucky, she lettered for four years and finished with a .377 batting average and a school-record .785 slugging percentage. She ended her college career as the Wildcats’ all-time leader in home runs (68), RBIs (212) and walks (155).
In a short time, she went from college to pro ball to being a graduate assistant softball manager at the University of Florida. The past year has been a whirlwind, but a good one.
“Yeah, it’s been quite a bit,” she said. “I went to Florida to be a GA there. I’ve been around softball since I was done last year at AU. I went to Gainesville right away, so softball has not left my life in any sort of manner. I just continue to train and do what I needed to do. I came back here in a really, really good mindset.”
Coffel admitted to being burned out at the end of her college days, but her spirit has been refreshed.
“College softball is hard; it’s tough,” she said. “And I didn’t even make it to the World Series. I just think that after the four years of that and trying my best and giving my all to Kentucky, I was just toasted by the end of it, and I was burnt out by the end of it. But I gave my all to that program. I have no regrets about it, and I would be burned out all over again for it.”
Coming to Athletes Unlimited to play alongside players with similar college experiences helped rejuvenate Coffel.
“Just meeting new people and creating new friendships here and talking to the veterans about how they go about their routines and stuff like that was so refreshing,” she said. “Meeting new people and people I hadn’t seen in a few years was super, super refreshing for me, just to be around like-minded people who love softball as much as I do.”
She was born in a small town
It’s hard not to have “Small Town” by John Mellencamp (also a Hoosier by birth) going through your head when you’re talking to or about Erin Coffel. Bremen is quintessential mid-America.
“It was as much as you could think it is,” she said of growing up there. “I grew up playing in our little rec league in town. I played with my best friends growing up throughout school. I didn’t really compete in elite travel ball space until I was in seventh or eighth grade. Then I got the real taste of that. I just played rec league, and I played high school ball with my best friends. I actually won a state championship with them.
“I think that is exactly what I needed, that separation between travel ball and high school ball. High school was more for fun, getting to play with your friends you grew up playing with. Travel ball is a time to lock in and get recruited.”
Coffel received support from her parents, with her dad, Rob, serving as her hitting coach.
“My dad is my hitting coach and has always been my hitting coach,” she said. “He has played a major role in my life in that aspect. Whenever I go home, I hit with him. I always send him videos. He’s the guy I always go back to. I’m lucky enough to follow my dad.”
It wasn’t long before Coffel knew that softball was her sport.
“I was pretty young,” she said. “I was playing with girls that were my age. It was not really fair to the other girls. My parents wanted to move me up and bump me up into that other league. So I think that’s when I knew. My brothers were playing baseball, too. So I was always playing with them, as well. I got blessed playing with them and being able to watch them grow up. I think that helped me a lot.”
Sixth-round pick
Considering how well she has done this season, it’s hard to believe Coffel was the last pick in the sixth round of the AUSL Inaugural Draft.
Dalton-Hill tried to put it all into perspective and compared it to how things work in baseball.
“I hate the fact that we do compare it to baseball,” the GM said with a resigned smile. “But before we went into the draft – my background has some baseball in it, too – I called minor league GMs, I called MLB GMs. Our sport is just different. In MLB, they draft pitchers last and use those arms. They don’t put a lot of emphasis or money into the big arm in the draft.
“So for us, when I talked to all these gentlemen, I’m like, ‘Our sport is different. We have to draft the pitcher first.’ While Erin Coffel may have been drafted in the sixth round, she has by far surpassed sixth-round projections. But it’s because we had to secure some other pieces before we could get to that spot. So it should not negate her importance to the team or to what’s she’s done so far. We just had to get some other pieces in place before we could get to her.”
For her part, Coffel seemed not bothered at all by being “overlooked.”
“I took that with a grain of salt,” she said. “Looking at last year and what I put out last year, I understood. For me, I was just driven to be the best softball player I could be, but to be better than I was last year. I wasn’t very happy with where I was physically, and I’m really happy with the work I put in over the off-season to get better.”
The ‘ouch’ factor
In addition to her hard hitting, Coffel has taken some hard hits at the plate, as evidenced by those 13 times she’s been plunked by pitches. That should not be surprising. Last year in the Athletes Unlimited Championship Season (now the All-Star Cup), she led the league in being hit by pitches, with seven.
“I do stand pretty close to the plate,” she said. “My senior year, Coach (Rachel) Lawson challenged me to get on the plate a little bit and not be afraid to get hit by a pitch. I think literally ever since then, I’ve just been over the plate, and it takes me a little bit into the river. They try to bust me in, so I’ll take what I can get to get on base.”
Part of her high on-base percentage is understanding the level of pitching she’s up against day in and day out.
“I think every single pitcher I have faced is elite,” she said. “You have to come in with a good mindset and a good approach to each one. In college, you can get away with looking at the first two starters in the rotation, but after that, you just make adjustments as you go. I like to make sure I have a plan and an approach. Coming into pro ball, I feel like last year I was just kind of guessing, and I didn’t really have a plan or an approach. I was just trying to see ball, hit ball, which I think I still do a little bit of. But I like to have a little bit more of an approach to each pitcher.”
Living the small-town dream
Coffel is now a fully established pro. The adjustments from college to pro ball have been mental and physical.
“I think mentally has been the biggest thing for me, just ultimately believing in myself and trusting all the work that I’ve put in,” she said. “You can work as hard as you want, but if you don’t believe in yourself, it really doesn’t do much for you. I think I’ve struggled with that a lot in my career. So now that I finally believe in myself and I’m talking to myself in the right way, I think it’s been huge for me.
“Physically, I just think I’ve put myself in a really good spot to be in shape and to take this rugged season. There’s been a lot of injuries we’ve seen so far. I think I’ve done a really good job of staying consistent with my workout routine and just staying in shape. Obviously I’ve made some adjustments at the plate, as well.”
All of that has made her a legit MVP candidate alongside Zerkle in the eyes of her coach.
“Give me a name who deserves it more than she does,” said Bandits Head Coach Stacey Nuveman Deniz. “I would put her numbers up against anybody’s. There are other great players having good years. I absolutely think she is making a case for herself.”
Come what may, you can forgive Coffel if she has to pinch herself for living the small-town dream.
“I never really had that dream,” she said. “It was always just, ‘Oh, I’m just playing softball to play softball.’ I didn’t really grow up watching softball. I grew up watching baseball for the most part. I never really had that dream until I got to seventh grade, eighth grade. And then it kind of hit me that I was capable of doing that, achieving that. When this league came about, I was like, ‘I can be a part of that one day,’ and I think that was my goal, my end goal, and obviously the 2028 Olympics.”
Bruce Miles has covered sports in the Chicago area for 46 years, including baseball, hockey, football and Athletes Unlimited Pro Softball. He covered the Chicago Cubs in their historic run to the World Series title in 2016. He has written stories for Athletes Unlimited since 2020.
Follow Bruce on Bluesky @brucemiles2112.bsky.social and on X @brucemiles2112
