Under The Knife 6/2/25
Content Is King. Softball Is the Queen.
I’ll be on Foul Territory this afternoon (Monday), so tune in to see me.
Major League Baseball made a move this week that a lot of people will misread. They took a stake in Athletes Unlimited, the growing multi-sport organization best known for its women’s leagues. The headlines will focus on the softball league. They’ll mention Kim Ng, now Commissioner of AU Softball, and frame the whole thing as “supporting the women’s game.” That’s not wrong, but it’s not the full story.
This is about television. More accurately, streaming. MLB isn’t in the business of doing the right thing just because it’s right. They backed off their longstanding minority pushes under anti-”DEI” pressure. This is a media play, built around long-term strategy and the changing way sports are consumed.
AU Softball is a perfect fit for this new model. It’s fast. It’s accessible. It has personalities. The barnstorming structure means it doesn’t need stadiums, charters, or a full season. It’s a product built for content, not for gates. That’s exactly where MLB is headed.
Look around. Women’s sports are growing. Not slowly. Not quietly. The WNBA is headed for a media rights payday (and a potential CBA meltdown.) The NWSL just landed a deal worth $60 million per year. The NCAA Women’s Tournament was the biggest ratings story of March. There are stars now. There is demand. What used to be a novelty or a nice-to-have is now a business opportunity. Fans aren’t asking for permission. They’re showing up.
Softball sits right in the middle of this shift. The college game already outperforms expectations. The Women’s College World Series draws better ratings than a lot of early-round MLB playoff games. There’s a clear pipeline of talent. There’s a built-in fan base. There’s money, including million dollar NILs. What it’s lacked is a stable pro league with reach and structure. Athletes Unlimited fills that gap.
Kim Ng legitimizes the whole thing. She’s not a figurehead. She’s run a Major League team. She’s worked in the league office. She knows what the job takes. More important, people inside and outside the game trust her. That matters because this isn’t a one-off. This is a strategic alignment. MLB isn’t looking at softball as a charity project. They’re looking at it as programming. When she came on - and I’ve been watching closely as softball is the fastest growing segment at NTangible - it was clear that this partnership was the direction things were heading.
Don’t expect this to be the WNBA either. Softball doesn’t fit in the off-days or even in the stadiums. If you want every MLB team to have their own “sister squad” in every major league town, that’s feasible. Asking the city to build a 10,000 seat softball stadium that could also get used by locals is a much easier ask. MLB owners are involved in this as a group and I’m curious if they’ll get involved more locally. If Steve Cohen can buy into a golf simulator league, he can buy into a softball league that could add one more thing to play in his Queens wonderland. A softball field may not fit in Citi or the Ashe, but there’s room down there for more (plus the casino, maybe.)
MLB already has 162 games per team. That’s a lot, but there’s only so many times that MLB Network can replay games and Major League. The postseason is a tight window. The rest of the calendar is a blank space. If MLB wants to act like a media company, they need more to sell. More content. More games. More faces.
Softball gives them that. It fits with the pace and style of the modern sports viewer. It doesn’t require explaining. The skill level is high and the demographics are valuable. Women’s sports tend to draw younger, more female, and more socially engaged viewers. That’s everything MLB has struggled to capture on its own. Now they have a way in.
This also opens the door to even more synergy and engagement. Imagine a world where AU Softball becomes part of the same app as MLB. Where highlights get shared across both properties. Where the next big NCAA softball star isn’t just signed by a team, but gets her own show, her own merch line, her own segment on MLB Network.
It’s not far off. It’s not even hard. MLB has the infrastructure. AU has the talent. What was missing was the money and the will. Now both are here. So yes, this is good for women’s sports. It’s good for softball. It’s a big step for AU, but let’s not pretend MLB is doing this just to be nice. They’re doing it to win.
In the next rights cycle, every league will be trying to bundle as much content as possible. The NBA has WNBA. The NFL has shoulder programming, youth leagues, and a stranglehold on calendar dominance. MLB needs something else. Softball might be it.
It’s not just a play for equality. It’s a play for relevance.
On to the injuries:
MOOKIE BETTS, SS LAD (broken toe)
Stars - they’re just like us! We’ve all done it at one time or another, walking through the house, somehow misjudging where that table is and screech-hopping for moments after toe met table leg. Contact with something in a dark bathroom resulted in not just cursing and pain for Mookie Betts, but a fracture at the tip of his second toe. The problem is, there’s not much anyone can do for a fractured toe. Doctors will tell you to not move it, not do things that cause pain, but aside from the use of a shank and some painkillers, it’s just wait.
The question for Betts and the Dodgers is function. Betts is out of the weekend series and they’ll try to use that time to figure out if he needs the IL - or rather, if the team needs the roster spot - but early indications are that he just needed a few days and should be back sometime this week. The Dodgers can survive that and even if Betts has a mild setback or just needs more time off, they have the flexibility to do that and maximize what they can get from Betts, who would be the best player on most other teams.
One rehab specialist I spoke to mentioned that he saw a 3D printed “toe-tie” - a high tech method of buddy taping - that a high school athlete used for a broken fifth toe. I couldn’t find anything on this, but the Dodgers resources make it so that anything is possible. We likely won’t get much on the how, but if Betts is able to return this week and looks reasonably comfortable, five or six games of his value is probably about a quarter win that the medical staff should be credited for.
AJ SMITH-SHAWVER, SP ATL (sprained elbow)
AJ Smith-Shawver had one of the most unique mechanisms of injury in recent memory. He got hit on the ankle with a comebacker, leaving the game just one batter later, but the injury was to his forearm? This confused a lot of people but if you watch him closely ahead of the comebacker, he was shaking his arm throughout the game, even early. The comebacker was just misdirection.
In fact, the forearm/elbow injury was enough that the team quickly pushed Smith-Shawver to the IL and sent him back to Atlanta for imaging. Brian Snitker said it didn’t look good and there’s rumblings of both UCL and flexor issues. Tests confirmed the UCL tear and he’s headed for elbow reconstruction, ending his 2025 and depending on what’s done, a big chunk of 2026 as well. Bryce Elder came up to take his start and will try to hold the position as the Braves do the same.
The Braves are at a bit of an inflection point. With Ronald Acuna back, the team is near full strength. They’ve got enough depth that they DFA’d and dealt Orlando Arcia, who was an All Star last season but had underperformed this year. The front office will have to make more hard decisions if they don’t surge, with some teams thinking the Braves might be one of few deadline sellers with worthwhile talent. Sean Murphy, Alex Verdugo, even Chris Sale might be available, but the real interest is in the scads of mid-level pitching talent the Braves have. Balancing out some position players in deals could end up making Atlanta the pivot point for this year’s trade action.
More on Mike Trout’s return, Jackson Jobe’s exit, a bunch more pitching injuries (shocker!) and more, only for subscribers. Five bucks?