WPBL Week Four: The Boston Hunting Party

With Week Four wrapped, we are now two-thirds of the way through the WPBL’s first season. Each team has just five regular season games remaining on the schedule over the next two weeks. Over this past week, the teams at the bottom of the standings were able to close the gap against the teams at the top. Following Week Three, the California teams had the west coast looking like the best coast, but as we’ll explore, reports of beasts in the east are growing louder all the time.

As a reminder, these weekly roundups are designed to cover each week’s action by highlighting the most notable players, moments, and anything else I deem worthy of further commentary. For each edition of the recap, I re-license the naming rights to this list of highlights to whichever team I feel has won the week. And how does a team win the week? Well, unlike actual wins and losses in baseball, this type of win is purely subjective and will operate under the time-honored tradition of making it up as we go along.

Along with the list of highlights, the Unforced Errors section discusses the more confounding aspects of the prior week because good faith criticism is a necessary component of continuing progress. Rounding things out are the Historic Firsts of Lesser Renown. The league’s momentous firsts will obviously get their shine, but there’s something to be said for the more strange and mundane firsts, the smaller day-to-day occurrences that make a new league feel familiar and complete. Think of these firsts as the knickknacks on a shelf that make a new house feel like a home. Baseball fans won’t really feel settled into a new league until the first time a player on their favorite team commits a TOOTBLAN.

If you need a refresher on the league’s structure and mechanics, check out the Week One recap.

Controversial calls were all the rage this week, and that trend will continue here because yes, I am naming the last place Boston Hunters as your Week Four winner. Am I worried that the New York Heights, the only team to go 3-0 this week, might show up on my doorstep to bark directly in my face? A little. (I do live 1,500 miles away, so that helps. Oh, and barking is a real thing they do to get hyped up in the dugout.) Do I fear incurring the wrath of the Heights’ captain in particular? Yeah. Anyone who tells you they don’t find Denae Benites at least a little intimidating is lying.

Though Boston’s week did not meet the conventional standards for success, it was nevertheless compelling. The Hunters put up just one win and did absolutely nothing to improve their league-worst run differential, but team captain Alli Schroder followed up a strong start in Week Three by allowing just one earned run over four innings on Thursday, manager Jemile Weeks put on an entertaining show as he became the first manager to be ejected from a WPBL game, and answers to the questions surrounding one of Boston’s first round draft picks are slowly coming into focus. And though the team has probably grown weary of finding itself at the center of league controversy, both the Keith Foulke firing and the Weeks ejection have revealed a lot about the WPBL’s inner workings, and for that we owe the Hunters a debt of gratitude.

Speaking of that league-worst run differential, here are the current league standings. Since all four teams make the playoffs, this is more about understanding team quality as a function of how they stack up against one another:

Last week, there was a strong divide between the league’s haves and have-nots, but now the standings have formed a tight cluster around .500. Los Angeles and San Francisco both went 1-2, the Queens for the second consecutive week and the Firebells after failing to carry over the momentum from a dominant Week Three.

And now, the Week Four highlights.

The Boston Hunting Party

Self-Discovery

On Thursday night, Heights two-way player Claire Eccles was seen wearing glasses on the field for the first time. She wore them while batting and playing center field, but not while pitching. Eccles threw three innings and allowed one earned run on four walks and two strikeouts, while on offense she collected two singles and a stolen base.

After the game, Eccles told reporters that there hadn’t been many opportunities for her to play in night games over the past year or so. Playing in the WPBL has meant more games played during primetime, and the change in lighting conditions led to the realization that her vision had gotten worse in recent years. After struggling to track the spin on pitches while hitting, she put on her glasses and was able to see clearly again. She plans to get fitted for contacts in the coming days, and if not for the WPBL opening up opportunities for women to play under the lights, who knows how long it would have taken for her to start reaping the benefits of corrected vision.

In-Season Adjustments

Eccles isn’t the only hitter who has struggled to properly register a pitch’s spin. Hunters outfielder Lexi Hastings was the team’s fourth pick of the first round in the draft (yes, teams got to make multiple picks per round — it was very confusing), but up until this past week, she hadn’t played much like a high draft pick. Hastings arrived in Springfield fresh off a season playing for the Kansas City Diamonds of the Professional Softball League. After hitting her first home run in Sunday’s 7-3 win over the Queens, Hastings told reporters she’d been struggling to adapt her bat path to better align with the different pitch trajectories in baseball when compared to softball. Where in softball the pitches are more likely to have a rising action, the pitchers she is facing in the WPBL are throwing a lot of pitches designed to dive down and out of the zone.

Many professional hitters will tell you they don’t like overhauling their swing during the season, but for Hastings it was a necessary change if she wanted to be successful in the league. After managing just one hit in her first four games, she seems to have successfully gotten her bat path back in the hitting zone, because she has three hits (two doubles and a home run), three walks, and two stolen bases over her last three games.

Two New Coaches

Each team began the season with three coaches on staff, which was already a rather meager number compared to other pro leagues. Then consider that Heights manager Rocky Henley had to recruit her son, who had been playing baseball in Australia, to take the third spot on her staff, and that the Hunters had to use a player-coach in the form of catcher Beth Greenwood to fill out the staff in Boston, and suddenly the whole league was starting to feel a bit understaffed. Layer in Weeks (formerly an assistant coach for the Queens) taking over for Foulke as Boston’s manager, and oops, now Los Angeles only has two coaches.

But reinforcements were added this week when former major leaguer Tack Wilson joined the Hunters coaching staff and Pete Romero signed on to coach for the Queens. Wilson amassed eight total plate appearances across two major league seasons (1983 and 1987). Before, after, and in between his two brief stints in the big leagues, the outfielder bounced around the minors from 1976 to 1990, playing for the Dodgers, Twins, Giants, Angels, Rangers, Brewers, and A’s during that span. As a player, Wilson profiled as a contact/speed guy who swiped 538 bags over the course of his pro career. After retiring, Wilson spent over 10 seasons coaching in the minors and Taiwan. Though the Benites/Kelsie Whitmore home run race has captured a lot of headlines for the WPBL, its overall offensive style tilts more toward station-to-station small ball with aggressive baserunning. Wilson’s skill set as a player, combined with a decade of coaching experience, seemingly makes him an apt fit for the league.

Romero has several years of experience coaching Division II college baseball and managing in the local collegiate summer league, including multiple stints managing the Springfield affiliate of the Prospect League that also plays at Robin Roberts Stadium. As a resident of Springfield, Romero’s strongest ability might be his availability, but given that the league is scrambling to find extra help mid-season, there’s bound to be more begging than choosing going on.

A Bobblehead Night Performance™

On Saturday night, the WPBL distributed Ashton Lansdell bobbleheads to the first 250 fans through the gates at Robin Roberts Stadium. The former third baseman and newly minted right fielder for the Queens responded in kind, smacking two home runs to drive in five of Los Angeles’ seven runs. The Queens fell to the Heights, 8-7, but Lansdell played her part by absolutely going off on her bobblehead night. I suspect the perception that players tend to have stand out performances on their bobblehead nights is mostly an example of confirmation bias, rather than a meaningful trend. But even if it is a farce, believing in the magic of bobblehead nights is a victimless crime, so feel free to disregard the previous sentence.

Lansdell’s bobblehead night becomes even more impressive when taken in the context of her season. Saturday’s game was just her second start in right field after volunteering to cede third base in order to open up more playing time for the other infielders on the roster. And though she hit two home runs on Saturday, Lansdell’s first home run of the season came just one night prior. After homering twice during the group stage of the Women’s Baseball World Cup just before the start of the WPBL season, Lansdell’s power outage over her first three weeks as a Queen came as something of a surprise, though it hasn’t stopped her from being productive at the plate. She’s still slashing .448/.600/.828 on the season.

The Upward Trend Elevating the Heights

New York currently owns the league’s worst ERA at 8.19, but two pitchers have the team trending in the right direction. Jaida Lee posted an uneven performance in the first half of the season. After a strong five-inning start with no earned runs and three strikeouts against San Francisco on August 6, she followed up with a relief outing against Boston on August 9 in which she allowed three earned runs on two hits and three walks over just a third of an inning. Lee’s lowest point came in her second outing against the Firebells on August 15, when her start lasted just 3 1/3 innings and she allowed six earned runs on eight hits, a walk, and five strike outs.

But that lone walk may have been positive foreshadowing for what was to come because when she made her second appearance against the Hunters on Thursday (a 9-4 Heights win), she notched three strikeouts over two innings while not allowing a single hit, walk, or earned run. Then in an 8-7 win over the Queens on Saturday, Lee allowed one run on one hit over 3 2/3 innings with six strikeouts. After Saturday’s game, Lee told reporters that she attributes the turnaround to improved command, saying she’s hitting her spots better and trusting Benites to call a good game. With her walk totals under control and a league-leading 19 strikeouts to her name, Lee is now a stabilizing force for the Heights pitching staff.

Also contributing to the Heights’ improved pitching is Australian Claire O’Sullivan. A late arrival to the Heights roster, O’Sullivan made her first start on August 9 against the Hunters (the same game in which Lee struggled in relief). In her WPBL debut, O’Sullivan needed just 45 pitches to cover 3 2/3 innings. She allowed one earned run on four hits and no walks along with three strikeouts. Her next time out (this time in relief of Lee on August 15) was a bit shakier. The Firebells got to her for seven hits and two walks, which amounted to three earned runs over 2 2/3 innings pitched.

But then in Wednesday’s weather shortened meeting with San Francisco, O’Sullivan pitched four scoreless innings on two hits, two walks, and three strikeouts. And though the Heights trailed the Firebells 8-6 when she entered the game following a disastrous start from Keira Izumi, by holding San Francisco’s powerful offense scoreless, O’Sullivan opened the door for New York’s eventual comeback, which ended in an 11-8 victory. Of course it doesn’t hurt that in addition to her contributions on the mound, O’Sullivan is slashing .500/.571/.688 in 21 plate appearances since joining the Heights.

The WPBL’s First Ejection

In the top of the sixth inning on Thursday night, the Heights were batting with an 8-4 lead over the Hunters. With a runner on third and just one out, Boston’s main focus was on keeping the game within reach. Then left fielder Katherine Murphy hit a low liner to Raine Padgham, who made the catch at short and then quickly threw behind the runner at third to complete the double play and end the inning.

Or that’s how it looked.

Field umpire Joelyn Pullano ruled that the ball skimmed the infield dirt before settling in Padgham’s glove, meaning the batter was not out and the play at third was no longer a force. And since third baseman Kate Blunt did not apply a tag to the runner at third, no out was recorded there either. So in the space of just a few seconds, the Hunters defense went from thinking they’d secured an inning-ending double play to runners on the corners with still just one out. Here’s the clip of Padgham’s play on the ball, so you can judge for yourself whether she made the catch:

Padgham clearly believed that she made the catch, which is why she threw to third for the second out. She does seem to hesitate slightly on the transfer, sparing a quick glance at the umpire, but there’s no time to wait for a call if she wants to get the out at third. I’m not entirely sure how Pullano determined that Padgham didn’t make the catch, since the video clearly shows Pullano’s back to the play at the moment the ball appears to land in Padgham’s glove.

Once the play concluded, Weeks came out to discuss the outcome with home plate umpire Emilie Herpick. During a guest appearance on the game broadcast the following evening, Weeks revealed that he initiated the conversation to seek clarification on the ruling because to his eyes, the umpires had not made a definitive call on either the catch or the play at third. The umpires aren’t seen making any calls in real time on the broadcast, but they also aren’t visible throughout the entire play, so it’s difficult to confirm or deny Weeks’ claim. Regardless, what we see of that first interaction between Weeks and Herpick looks remarkably calm:

After a few seconds, Pullano joins the discussion, and though Weeks looks dissatisfied with the answers he’s receiving, the overall vibe remains calm:

After the exchange concluded, Pullano turned to head back to the infield, and as she did so, her body language suggested she was not feeling quite as calm as everyone else. There’s a faint-but-detectable sneer on her face, and though you can’t technically see Pullano roll her eyes in response to being questioned by Weeks, it feels heavily implied:

As the broadcast cycled through the infield to show everyone getting set to resume play, Pullano is visible passing through a tight shot of pitcher Denver Bryant, clearly headed back toward Boston’s dugout. This is followed by consecutive shots of first baseman Maïka Dumais, Murphy (the baserunner at first), and Padgham all looking incredibly confused about why Pullano is re-engaging with Weeks. It’s possible someone in or around the dugout chirped at Pullano once her back was turned, but no inciting incident was visible or audible on the broadcast.

Then in something of a role reversal, the camera seemed to catch Weeks telling Pullano to watch her mouth in response to the last thing she said before storming back onto the field. Frequently, managers are ejected for using the “magic words,” which is typically understood to refer to language that is particularly coarse or insulting. Here, it seems the umpire was the one to utter something inflammatory in an attempted mic drop moment. Whatever else Weeks said in response was enough for Pullano to signal his ejection without even breaking her stride:

With most ejections, the ejection itself is where the drama concludes. Not so here. Like Sutter Health Park in Sacramento, going from the field to the clubhouses at Robin Roberts Stadium requires a long walk down the left field line. When A’s manager Mark Kotsay was ejected from a game in May of 2025, he put his head down and set a fairly brisk pace as he exited the playing field. Weeks opted for a slightly sassier approach. He took his time as he carefully gathered his belongings from the dugout, then instead of putting his head down and getting out of there, he did this:

The actual walk off the field was about three times as long as this clip, but you get the idea. And yes, that is the league commissioner in the background getting up to tail him in case further antics ensue.

But it’s that polite nod to the ball boy as he’s almost off the field that truly seals the performance.

Weeks’ ejection doesn’t just make the list because it was the WPBL’s first. The historic nature of it certainly helps, but in this case, history will be worth remembering because this ejection was pure cinema. Give me four or five more camera angles of everything going on, and a broadcast production crew more adept at following the action, and this ejection would have had everything.

First, since the call was actually controversial — but not obviously incorrect — the drama felt genuine and earnest, as opposed to when a manager is clearly wrong, but continues to argue with the goal of getting tossed to fire up his team. It had the sort of character development that humanizes players and coaches, making them more relatable to fans. For instance, we now know Weeks isn’t the type of manager to get performatively angry; rather, he attempts to remain calm, but once provoked, he’ll put on a show in his own distinct way. No kicking dirt on home plate or running back on the field to get his money’s worth. And it created the worst possible outcome for Pullano because now a bunch of people know her by name. The deepest desire of most umpires is to pass through every game in a completely anonymous and nondescript fashion, but now fans are going to be yelling Pullano’s government name at their televisions every time they disagree with a call. For her sake, I hope she doesn’t have a self-produced country album lurking on the internet somewhere.

Unforced Errors

No One Knows What the Rules Are

Several incidents this week highlighted the lack of clarity around both the rules of the game itself and the league’s operational policies. First, during Wednesday’s game between the Heights and the Firebells, play was suspended part way through the bottom of the sixth inning due to lightning in the area; about an hour later, the game was called. WPBL games are considered official after four innings (or three and a half, if the home team is winning), so there was no need to suspend and resume the game. But different leagues and levels of baseball have their own ways of handling any partially completed innings beyond the four required for an official game. Some leagues revert back to the last completed inning, with any stats compiled or runs scored in the final, incomplete inning officially wiped from the record books. The alternative is to freeze all stats and scoring at the moment play is suspended, which is how MLB operates.

But as WPBL co-founder Justine Siegal noted in a recent interview, the league does not yet have its own dedicated rulebook. Instead, it largely defers to the MLB rulebook, except in scenarios where league officials feel it makes more sense to apply the rules specifically laid out for women’s baseball by the World Baseball Softball Confederation. As events unfolded on Wednesday night, it became clear that no one in the WPBL’s baseball operations department had formally declared how to handle the record keeping associated with weather-shortened games, which was relevant since the Heights had scored a run in the top half of what turned out to be the game’s final frame. As such, the broadcast reported one final score and the official boxscore sent out by the league reported another. Corrections were made the following morning and everything was cleared up with no harm done, but the whole situation revealed quite a bit about how the league is currently operating.

Then, following Weeks’ ejection on Thursday, it was announced that a manager ejection comes with an automatic one-game suspension. When asked if he was aware of the suspension that accompanies an ejection prior to his removal from the game on Thursday, Weeks told reporters, “I’m a new manager, I honestly didn’t know what was going on.” But he did note that managers who had been in place from the start might have been made more aware of league regulations. Weeks replaced Foulke as the manager of the Hunters just prior to Boston’s fourth game of the season. Hunters assistant manager Karavin Dew, who managed in place of Weeks during his suspension, told the media she was also unaware of the rule prior to Weeks’ suspension.

On Saturday, the Heights scored four runs in the top of the fifth to tie things up against the Queens. In the bottom of the inning, Los Angeles re-took the lead with a two-run homer from Lansdell. Then, with one out and a runner on first, Queens first baseman and left-handed hitter Adelaide Frank was called out as a result of batter interference when Benites, who was catching for the Heights at the time, motioned as though she was going to attempt a back-pick on the runner at first. Frank ducked, but remained in the box until Benites dropped her arm, at which point Frank stumbled backward out of the box.

Frank expressed confusion about what she had done to trigger the call and at being ruled out as a result of it. Queens manager Eric Young Sr. came out to discuss the matter with Pullano (who was umpiring behind the plate for this game), and after leaving that conversation unsatisfied, he attempted to appeal to field umpire Kelly Dine, but to no avail. Meanwhile in the broadcast booth, the commentators were only able to speak in general terms about how batter interference typically works, and based on that knowledge, they couldn’t definitively explain the call. Since they were unable to consult the league’s specific interference rules, they were unable to offer viewers any guidance on a perplexing situation that occurred at a crucial moment of a game the Heights would go on to win in extras.

Beyond wide-spread confusion around in-game rules, league policies have also been an ongoing source of uncertainty. The rules around active rosters were largely unknown until a press release last week revealed that teams are permitted to roster 17 total players, but that only 15 can be declared active for each game. In recent weeks, the league has gotten better about sending out lineups before each game (which was not happening early in the season), but the information sent does not always indicate which players are inactive.

Further, there is no formal injury designation process, nor does the league announce roster moves. Given that this is a league where several players have prior obligations requiring them to be away from the team periodically throughout the season (typically a job with an in-person component, though several players will be missing time to attend college classes with the new semester starting this week), it’s nearly impossible to know which players might actually play in any given game. In addition to players dipping in and out, a handful of international players arrived a week or two after Opening Day due to visa issues. Their sudden appearances in games were also unannounced surprises, as were the additions of players called in to cover when it became clear not every team would have a full roster to start the season. The league knows who is and isn’t in Springfield at any given time, but it hasn’t consistently made that information publicly accessible.

The one instance where a roster move was officially communicated involved the WPBL’s first trade. On Saturday morning, a press release went out announcing a trade between the Heights and the Queens in which New York would send outfielder Dianna Ibarra to Los Angeles in exchange for outfielder Suzu Narasaki and shortstop Emi Saiki. An interesting addendum declared the transaction a “manager initiated trade,” which prompted the following additional statement from the league: “Per WPBL policy, player trades can be initiated in two ways: (1) The league arranges a player trade between teams to meet the goals and objectives of the league, or (2) a team manager or group of two managers may request a player trade for approval by the League.”

In his postgame media availability on Saturday night, Young explained that he approached Heights manager Rocky Henley about his struggle to find playing time for the glut of shortstops on his roster. The two of them were able to work out a deal where both sides could trade from a surplus at one position to fill a need at another. Even though the process is a bit more streamlined and involves managers negotiating rather than front offices, this trade and others falling into the second category of the league’s policy are fairly similar to how business is handled in other pro leagues.

But that first category of trades — the ones initiated by the league — opens up a whole mess of possibilities. The phrase “to meet the goals and objectives of the league” could mean literally anything. The league was asked for further clarification and examples of what might apply under this rule, but it has yet to respond. Would league-initiated trades be based strictly on making sure each team has a full roster with all positional needs met, or might the WPBL attempt to enforce a certain level of parity? Since there is no player’s union and the league owns and operates all four teams, there’s nothing to stop the WPBL from acting unilaterally to shake up the rosters however it sees fit. Sure, it might make the whole endeavor feel more like a reality competition show where the powers-that-be can introduce a surprise twist whenever they see fit, but that is an entertainment model with a proven track record. After all, there are 50 seasons (and counting) of Survivor. Now, I haven’t seen anything from the WPBL to suggest that it wants to be anything other than a serious professional sports league, and a vaguely stated policy might simply be designed to make it easier for the league to adapt on the fly, but it also leaves space for outside observers to question the league’s motives and wonder what it might be trying to get away with behind the scenes.

All new leagues experience growing pains, and everything described above falls under that heading, but all of it would go away if the WPBL was willing and able to communicate more openly and frequently across the board. Because it’s incredibly difficult for fans to get invested in a league when there’s no avenue for them to understand how anything actually works. Players and coaches can’t be the best versions of themselves when they don’t know which version of baseball’s rulebook might apply at any given moment. And when the league isn’t fulfilling basic functions like announcing roster moves, the whole operation starts to feel flimsy and illegitimate.

None of which is to say that the WPBL needs to have every policy and procedure completely worked out right this very second. In the interview referenced above, Siegal admits that expanding rosters from 15 to 17 with two inactive players per game was a late-breaking modification to the rules that offered necessary flexibility to account for players working through visa issues at the start of the season, and then to compensate for work- and school-related absences. This demonstrates that a certain amount of making it up along the way is tolerable — if the league can also provide evidence that a sound process was used to motivate the change. But before Siegal provided that insight, it was easy to assume that the WPBL was openly defying its own roster limits, implying that the league could (and perhaps would) radically change the composition and quality of a roster at any time by adding more players.

The league may prefer to keep things internal wherever possible to avoid looking like a hot mess on such a big stage, but increased transparency prevents the public imagination from running wild and allows everyone involved to understand and interact with the league more productively.

Umpire Accountability

In most professional leagues, when a game involves a complex or controversial call, it’s customary for a member of the officiating crew to be made available after the game to answer questions from a pool reporter (i.e. one specific member of the media assigned to ask questions on behalf of the entire group of reporters covering the game) about what they saw on the play, which rule they were drawing from to make the call, their interpretation of the rule, and how it applied to the play in question. Postgame statements from officials are largely intended to be informational, but they also serve as a form of accountability, since umpires know that on any given day they may be asked to publicly justify their actions.

The Weeks ejection and the batter interference call on Frank were both perplexing situations that needed additional insight from the officiating crew in order to make sense of what happened, but none was offered. And since umpires are basically doling out suspensions when they eject a manager from the game, it’s all the more important to have a reasonable explanation from the umpire to defend the decision.

Historic Firsts of Lesser Renown

• In the top of the fifth inning of Wednesday’s game against the Firebells, Heights shortstop Val Perez bat flipped a hit-by-pitch.
• The league experienced its first weather delay and later its first weather-shortened game as a result of lightning in the area on Wednesday night.
• In the top of the second inning of Saturday’s game against the Hunters, Samantha Gutierrez hit her first long ball for the Firebells, and as she circled the bases, she logged the league’s first home run trot to exceed 30 seconds.