Bandits athlete Sami Williams not only has a career in professional softball but one in pro baseball, too. Williams is a Senior Software Engineer for the Chicago Cubs. She has worked in Baseball Systems for the club for over four years, and on Tuesday night, was honored with the Katy Feeney Leadership Award.
The annual award was created to recognize exceptional female employees in Major League Baseball.
Thirty-two women, representing all 30 MLB clubs, MLB Network, and the MLB league office, were nominated. Williams, along with the other recipients, was celebrated at the 2025 Winter Meetings during the Women on Deck Reception.
Kim Ng, Athletes Unlimited Softball League commissioner and a Katy Feeney Award recipient, spoke to the crowd at the reception. Ng was the first female general manager in MLB (and by any major professional men’s team in North America).
“Katy was, in her own right, an incredible inspiration to a lot of us who were in the workforce in baseball,” Ng said. “Everybody knew who Katy was. Her standards of excellence were always right there. She was such a staunch believer in what she was doing. … It’s been a few years now since Katy’s been with us, but I think her legacy obviously lives on.”
Feeney was a pioneering female executive in baseball for 40 years, and the award was created following her untimely death in 2017 to recognize other exceptional female employees in baseball. It is a prestigious award that celebrates the significant contributions and outstanding initiative demonstrated in MLB and honors the legacy of Feeney, whose influence has left an indelible mark on the game.
Savanna Collins is the Senior Reporter for the AUSL. You can follow her on X @savannaecollins.
