Pitch for better pay arrives via pricey arm
Playing on area’s new pro team, Abbott sees $1 million deal become symbol for plight of female athletes
First pitch is two hours away, and the world’s best softball player is losing time.
Instead of rolling a foam cylinder along her muscles and loosening her arms with stretching bands, Monica Abbott is crouching with her left hand in her glove. This is the beginning of her windup. A cameraman is standing in front of her to record it.
More than 10 times Abbott goes through this motion — drawing her left foot closer to her right one, which remains still, as she stands straight. All of this for a YouTube-based sports channel. When the cameraman messes up a shot, she clenches her jaw and purses her lips. Her eyes widen. Her annoyance leaks out.
While Abbott’s teammates warm up on an adjacent field, the cameraman asks her to face the lens and explain why nutrition is important to athletes. When she doesn’t specifically use the word “athletes,” he makes her answer again. Then once more for good measure.
This is the responsibility that comes with the six-year, $1 million contract Abbott signed in May with the Houston-area Scrap Yard Dawgs, the newest franchise in the National Pro Fastpitch women’s softball league. It’s the first million-dollar contract in the six-team league’s 13-season history. It is believed to be the most lucrative deal paid by an American professional franchise to an active female athlete in team sports.
Signing Abbott, 30, gave an immense competitive boost to the Scrap Yard Dawgs, but it did more than that: It made Abbott, a nine-year National Pro Fastpitch veteran, the league’s spokeswoman for the general lack of pay for
female athletes.
Before Abbott arrived at the stadium Friday, she stopped at a Starbucks in a Kroger in Spring, less than two miles from the Scrap Yard Sports Complex and, despite being one of today’s most important female athletes, went unnoticed.
Some NPF players earn as little as $5,000 for the three-month season. They purchase their own Gatorade at the concession stand. Teams provide housing for players because many cannot afford out-of-pocket expenses. After a few years, players often walk away from softball to find a better living.
Most softball players, including Abbott, spend their offseasons playing for Japanese teams to supplement their income. WNBA players also go abroad after their American seasons.
“I knew it was a big deal, but I don’t think I really realized how important it was to not only the women athletic community but also really the world,” Abbott said. “How issues that I was facing relate to a woman working in a desk job or in an office every day.”
The NPF has a yearly salary cap of $150,000 per team in guaranteed money to make up its 23-player rosters. Abbott is guaranteed $20,000 yearly. The rest of the contract is made up of a few easy-to-achieve attendance bonuses. The exact number depends on the season. To maximize her income this year, Abbott needs nine games with at least 100 people in attendance.
Scrap Yard Dawgs general manager Connie May is so intent on satisfying the attendance clause that she originally wanted it to require just a single person at each game. NPF commissioner Cheri Kempf asked her to make the number bigger, so May settled on 100 people, not all of whom need to pay to watch.
Abbott doesn’t need to be pitching. The Dawgs don’t need to be playing at home. May said she’ll count umpires and the players in both dugouts if it gets Abbott the bonus.
“I wanted Monica to know she was going to get that money,” May said.
Unique ownership
Kempf, NPF’s commissioner since 2007, said not every team can afford a contract of this magnitude. In the relatively low-budget league — the Dawgs’ locker room is a private space created from a series of black tarp walls in their dugout — Kempf worries whether such a deal will sink a franchise.
An advantage the Scrap Yard owners have, May said, is they own the team’s field, one of nine turf fields on the Scrap Yard Sports Complex that is just east of The Woodlands. The complex will host more youth tournaments if the team needs more money for another big contract.
For now, Abbott’s is the only highly publicized contract on the team. Twentythree women all receiving an above-average salary to play professional softball doesn’t draw the same publicity as a $1 million contract.
“It’s kind of like the lottery,” Kempf said. “Would you rather one person win $50 million, or would you rather 50 people win a million?”
Abbott was a four-time All-American at Tennessee, where she led the NCAA in victories in each of her four seasons. She went 189-32 with a 0.79 ERA, recording 23 no-hitters and six perfect games. This season, she’s 14-1 with nine complete games, and Scrap Yard is two games out of first place despite having 16 rookies.
May initially offered the contract via text message. She wrote Abbott about Nolan Ryan, who signed baseball’s first milliondollar contract when he joined the Astros after the 1979 season. She asked Abbott who the first woman to sign such a deal would be. Then she flew to Japan, where Abbott was playing at the time, and finished the deal. Abbott signed May 5.
“I’ve been playing softball a long time, and salaries like that aren’t offered,” Abbott said. “It’s unheard of, and although in my head of course I had hoped and dreamed of something like that happening, I wasn’t sure I was going to see it in my career.”
Abbott wants female athletes to raise their expectations in contract negotiations. May believes that has happened. She said the general manager of the Pennsylvania Rebellion, owner of the 2016 No. 1 pick, “expressed his displeasure” because Abbott’s deal influenced the contract demands of top pick Lexie Elkins of LouisianaLafayette.
TV deal a must
But Michael Leeds, a sports economist at Temple University, said longlasting financial health, both for players and the league, will only come with a greater television deal and increased corporate sponsorship.
In April, NPF and CBS Sports Network agreed to a 25-telecast deal for this season. Kempf said NPF’s largest sponsors are its official uniform and helmet providers, Boombah and Rawlings. The league doesn’t have a corporate sponsor that isn’t softball-related.
“The key is television,” Leeds said. “That really is the biggest single barrier to entry and the single biggest lifeline that a league can have.”
Abbott’s contract might bring in only a modest number of additional fans this season. Her influence does not compare with the kind of corporate sponsorships and television contracts that elude NPF.
“Hopefully, we build a couple bridges,” she said. “They build over time. There’s not a right answer to that question now.”
Abbott lives with two teammates. She might live on her own in future seasons. Although she can afford that luxury, she wanted to ensure a connection to her teammates this season. She’s one of just three current NPF players to have played in the league more than six seasons.
Although Abbott’s financial circumstances are far different from those of her teammates, roommate Emilee Koerner said the team’s oldest player has a “childish humor” that allows her to connect with the rest of the Dawgs.
“A lot of us view her contract as a growth to not only the game of softball but to female athletes, and we get to say that’s part of our team,” Koerner said.
Before Friday’s game, Abbott held her elastic stretching bands above her head with both hands and popped her hips to dance to Shakira. Her catcher laughed at her.
Catering to kids
NPF players have a 45-minute autograph session after every game for children under 18. After Friday’s 1-0 win, Abbott sat at one end of a series of plastic tables set up in the outfield. She was the last player kids met after they lined up single file, as though she were the ultimate reward for coming. About 150 people were in the stands for her ninestrikeout complete game.
Toward the end of the autograph session, Abbott turned to May, who stood behind her. She told the general manager about how she’d met Hall of Fame pitcher Randy Johnson in the Atlanta airport when the team was traveling that week.
Johnson didn’t want to take a picture with Abbott. He asked if they could take it while walking because he was in a rush to get to his gate. Then he told Abbott he wanted to stop and get a drink on the way. After enough nagging, he agreed to pose for a picture with one of America’s most important female athletes.
“He big-timed you?” May said.
“He tried to,” Abbott replied.
“Good for you,” May said. “You should’ve bigtimed him.”