Season 1: Episode 5

Going Pro

Sep 10, 2026

The new women’s pro leagues in baseball and fastpitch softball are both fun, both promising—but also very different. The WPBL is a bat signal to prospective players that women’s baseball exists, while the AUSL aims to propel softball to the big time.

Featuring Amira Hondras, Meggie Meidlinger, Sabrina Robinson and Justine Siegal from the Women's Pro Baseball League, and Cheri Kempf and Morgan Zerkle from the Athletes Unlimited Softball League.

Show Notes

Going Pro was an especially fun episode to report because it involved checking out ballgames from two new leagues, the AUSL (Athletes Unlimited Softball League) and WPBL (Women’s Pro Baseball League). The “brand new team” thing took me back to one of my first experiences as a journalist, when I interned for WLNS-TV sports in Lansing, Michigan, during the summer of 1996. It was the debut season for the minor league Lansing Lugnuts, and we were at the ballpark for pretty much every home game. Usually that meant grabbing highlights for the 11pm news, but a few times we produced a live telecast. My job on those game broadcasts was to shove pieces of paper in front of the on-air broadcasters, Dave Akerly and Mickey Lolich. The pieces of paper contained ad text for various sponsors—stuff that Dave and (Tigers legend) Mickey were supposed to read on-air, but it usually took a lot of begging and shoving to make it happen.

On to the actual show notes …

In the closing credits, I mentioned a few Substacks that have covered the WPBL’s first season:

I also recommended Jean Fruth’s women’s baseball documentary film See Her, Be Her, which you can stream on Prime Video.

Other links:

A couple of pieces on Major League Baseball’s investment in the AUSL
Stats charting the AUSL’s growth this season
The Banana Ball-inspired league that includes the Rocket Squirrels, Sabrina Robinson’s team
An article from the Society of American Baseball Research about Banana Ball’s women players
The short, business-focused story I wrote about an upstart pro softball league in the 2000s that featured Jennie Finch and Cat Osterman.
I mentioned Meggie Meidlinger is a sports architect. She’s featured in this piece from her firm about how playing sports informs her architectural work.
Justine Siegal’s youth baseball organization, Baseball For All
Last month I released an Uningrained Extended Play episode featuring a longer version of my interview with Meggie Meidlinger. Great conversation with a really interesting person—check it out!