AUSL to Hold Inaugural Draft Live on January 29
- Bandits Win Draft Lottery and are Awarded First Overall Pick
- 80 of World’s Top Softball Players Declare Themselves Eligible to be Drafted
- Unprecedented Benefits for All Players Selected to Include Year-Round Health Insurance, In-Season Childcare, Among Many Others
The Athletes Unlimited Softball League (AUSL) announced the league’s inaugural draft will be held live on Wednesday, January 29 at 8 p.m. ET on the ESPN App and the newly launched AUSL YouTube page. ESPN analyst Andraya Carter will host the show, with analysis provided by veteran ESPN softball commentators Amanda Scarborough and Danielle Lawrie.
The AUSL Inaugural Draft will determine the initial 12 players to be selected to play for each of the league’s first four teams: the Bandits, Blaze, Talons, and Volts. Each team’s general manager and head coach will plan, strategize, and make the selections to build out their 16-player rosters.
Featuring 2022 AU Pro Softball Champion Dejah Mulipola, 2023 Defensive Player of the Year Jessi Warren, Carley Hoover, and Montana Fouts, the player pool will continue to expand ahead of the draft with announcements of signings on theAUSL.com. The current player pool is available here and will be updated leading up to the draft.
The four remaining roster spots will be filled with a combination of free agents and the incoming class of the top NCAA talent who will finish their eligibility in May.
In addition to the opportunity to compete in the new league, all players selected in the draft will receive benefits unprecedented in the sport’s history, including year-round health insurance, mental health services, paid leave for pregnancy or adoption, and in-season childcare.
The Bandits, via a lottery, were awarded the first overall selection, followed by the Blaze, Talons, and Volts. To ensure parity, picks will be selected in a rotating draft order. The first pick of each round will rotate among the four teams as follows:
- Round 1: Bandits, Blaze, Talons, Volts
- Round 2: Blaze, Talons, Volts, Bandits
- Round 3: Talons, Volts, Bandits, Blaze
- Round 4: Volts, Bandits, Blaze, Talons
The AUSL Inaugural Draft will be decentralized, a format used in the NBA, NFL, and MLB. The coaches and general managers will select from their own locations rather than traveling to a central location.
As previously announced, the general managers and coaches are paired as follows:
- Bandits: Jenny Dalton-Hill and Stacey Nuveman-Deniz
- Blaze: Dana Sorensen and Alisa Goler
- Talons: Lisa Fernandez and Howard Dobson
- Volts: Cat Osterman and Kelly Kretschman
Tune in on January 29 at 8 p.m. ET / 7 p.m. CT on the ESPN App or the AUSL YouTube page as the four teams for the inaugural AUSL season are selected.
Launching in June 2025, the Athletes Unlimited Softball League (AUSL) is a professional women’s softball league featuring four teams playing a 24-game season in a traditional format.
Savanna Collins is the Senior Reporter at Athletes Unlimited. You can follow her on Twitter @savannaecollins.
