“It’ll be like being back in middle school picking teams for kickball,” said defender Meg Douty, one of four former Maryland standouts and 13 U.S. national team members committed to the Athletes Unlimited league. “You’re going to have to do your homework on the players in the league and strategize who you want to pick first.”
Jon Patricof co-founded Athletes Unlimited with Jonathan Soros after stepping down as president of Major League Soccer’s New York City FC after the 2018 season. Patricof saw untapped demand for women’s sports, particularly at the professional level. He also recognized the shifting nature of sports fandom, with younger fans’ rooting interests determined more by individuals than teams or leagues.
“We are living in an era where fans are really following and engaging with individual athletes,” Patricof said. “We wanted to create a model where we could put the players first, in terms of what happens on the field and off the field.”
Athletes Unlimited debuted with a five-week softball league, hosted in Rosemont, Ill., last August. Its second venture, an indoor volleyball league in Dallas, wrapped in March. Neither season had a game canceled or postponed, which is no small feat during the coronavirus pandemic. This summer’s lacrosse league could be Athletes Unlimited’s first with fans in attendance on a limited basis.
With a significantly shorter season than most professional leagues and its individual points system, the Athletes Unlimited single-city model is designed to create an experience for fans where every game — and every moment during a game — matters.
“With our scoring system, there are points on the line with every play,” Patricof said.
That’s not to say teamwork is no longer important.
“To find success, you have to have your team help you out,” said Athletes Unlimited midfielder Taylor Cummings, a three-time Tewaaraton Trophy winner at Maryland who coaches girls lacrosse and teaches at McDonogh when she’s not training for the national team. “I think the teams that work together and have the best chemistry will be the ones that see their players continually atop the rankings.”
Athletes Unlimited’s players are provided housing, most meals, transportation, child care, pregnancy and parental leave and access to top-level trainers. They’ll receive a minimum compensation of $10,000 for the season, with cash bonuses awarded for leading after quarters and winning games, and additional bonuses depending on where they finish on the points leader board.
Douty, who owns her own club and training program in New Jersey, All Lax All Day, was somewhat skeptical of the model at first, but is excited to compete again. The pandemic has effectively sidelined the national team from competition since 2019 and the Women’s Professional Lacrosse League, which was founded in 2018, became the latest women’s lacrosse league to fold last year.
“They’re blowing up women’s sports and doing it right,” Douty said of Athletes Unlimited. “They’re going to put women’s lacrosse on another level.”
Cummings, Douty’s former Maryland teammate, is thrilled to get to play close to home.
“To have not only my family at games, but to have young girls at our games and watching the best of the best compete in such a hotbed for lacrosse, I think it’s great for our sport, I think it’s great for the league,” she said.
Cummings and Patricof both believe the main thing preventing professional women’s lacrosse from gaining a foothold is exposure and fan engagement opportunities. The league has yet to announce the details of its television contract, but all games will be available on cable television or streaming online. The 2020 softball season was featured on CBS Sports Network and ESPN.
Patricof said the league has invested heavily in its digital and social teams, which will be tasked with telling the stories of the athletes. Broadcasts will feature many of the bells and whistles that viewers are accustomed to seeing in men’s leagues, including mic’d up athletes and behind the scenes footage. DraftKings offered a free-to-play daily fantasy game tied to the softball league last year.
With no owners or coaches, a Player Executive Committee meets regularly with Athletes Unlimited staff to help make decisions about how the league is run. The Athletes Unlimited advisory board features the likes of Abby Wambach, Karch Kiraly, Jessica Mendoza and Kevin Durant. In addition to sharing in any league profits for up to 20 years, players may elect to play for a specific charitable cause, with Athletes Unlimited promising to donate an amount equal to 50 percent of their points bonus to that cause.
Beyond all the perks and rule changes that differentiate Athletes Unlimited from other professional leagues, including the fantasy-sports-come-to-life scoring system, Patricof said the league’s biggest draw is its talent.
“We have the best women’s lacrosse players in the world,” he said. “Nothing comes close to being as important as that. … The players are helping design and run every element of the league, and recruiting their fellow players. At the end of the day, you get an amazing product because the athletes are totally bought in across the board.”
