{"id":307504,"date":"2026-07-28T11:31:09","date_gmt":"2026-07-28T11:31:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/307504\/"},"modified":"2026-07-28T11:31:09","modified_gmt":"2026-07-28T11:31:09","slug":"meet-the-new-york-heights-nycs-new-team-in-the-womens-professional-baseball-leagues-inaugural-season","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/307504\/","title":{"rendered":"Meet the New York Heights, NYC\u2019s new team in the Women\u2019s Professional Baseball League\u2019s inaugural season"},"content":{"rendered":"

The inaugural season of the Women\u2019s Professional Baseball League (WPBL)<\/a>, the first all-female, American pro baseball league in more than 70 years, will debut Saturday in Springfield, IL, with the New York Heights representing the Big Apple.<\/p>\n

Named for the iconic civil rights activist and longtime NYC resident, Dorothy Height, the New York Heights\u2019 roster of 15 women will take to the field at Robin Roberts Stadium in the sold-out opening-day game against the Los Angeles Queens, according to the WPBL.<\/p>\n

The city\u2019s newest professional sports team signed big names in women\u2019s baseball like U.S. Women\u2019s National Team members Kylee Lahners and Denae Benites, USWNT alum Valerie Perez and South Korean pitching sensation Rakyung Kim. But the Heights also scored some up-and-coming talent like 19-year-old London Studer at first base, and Canadian pitcher Jaida Lee.<\/p>\n

Studer, a first-round draft pick for the Heights and 19th overall, told amNewYork that she has very high hopes for the New York squad.\n<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t want to brag, but we have a strong bullpen, a strong rotation, and we have strong hitting USA players,\u201d Studer said.\n<\/p>\n

She predicted the Los Angeles Queens, featuring six-time Women\u2019s Baseball World Cup gold-medalist Ayami Sato and legendary Little League World Series pitcher Mo\u2019ne Davis, would be one of the New York Heights\u2019 most formidable opponents. Still, Studer anticipated victory.<\/p>\n

\u201cAll these teams are beatable, except for New York,\u201d she said. \u201cI mean\u2014 we\u2019re going to go undefeated.\u201d The first WPBL season is 15 games long, followed by semifinal and championship playoff rounds.<\/p>\n

\"LondonLondon Studer, 19 Ohio, will be the New York Heights\u2019 first base player in its upcoming inaugural season beginning on August 1 in Springfield, Illinois. Photo: Jaclyn Kalafut via WPBL<\/p>\n

Each of the four teams: the New York Heights, the Los Angeles Queens, the Boston Hunters and the San Francisco Firebelles, have a talented roster of well-seasoned ball players and promising new talent.<\/p>\n

Co-founder and league Commissioner Justine Siegal told amNewYork that the league represented a group of athletes who had already been playing the game at its highest level, and hopefully the WPBL will offer them a platform and a fan base equal to their talent.<\/p>\n

\u201c\u200aTogether, these women have been fighting and proving that women belong in baseball, and the WPBL is finally the chance they deserve to showcase how good they are and how fun they are to watch,\u201d Siegal said.<\/p>\n

New York Heights join the surge in women\u2019s sports around America<\/p>\n

Women\u2019s sports have seen a surge in popularity<\/a>, with viewership nearly tripling since 2020 and revenue growing 4.5 times faster than that of men\u2019s sports between 2022 and 2024, according to a market analysis<\/a> by McKinsey and Company. It\u2019s a trend that showed Siegal and her co-founder \u200aKeith Stein that now was the time to launch the WPBL.<\/p>\n

\u201c\u200aI love Major League Baseball,\u201d Siegal said. \u201cBut I think that the world is ready to watch women play this great game as well.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

Apparently, fans in the Big Apple agreed when the league unveiled the team jerseys and launched its fan merchandise line on July 8; New York Heights merch sold out in under three hours.\n<\/p>\n

But this year, NYC fans will have to travel if they want to see their team in person. The entire first season will be played on neutral ground in Springfield, IL, a city with historical significance to women\u2019s professional baseball as the site of the first paid ticketed women\u2019s game in 1875 between the Blondes and the Brunettes.<\/p>\n

It has been more than seven decades since the nation had a professional women\u2019s baseball league. The All-American Girls Professional Baseball League (AAGPBL) was founded by Chicago Cubs owner Phillip Wrigley during World War II, when many men were overseas fighting, and lasted from 1943 through 1954. Today, most people know of the league from the classic 1992 film \u201cA League of Their Own.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

The AAGPBL was concentrated in the Midwest, so New York was not represented during the league\u2019s short run. But New York has its place in women\u2019s baseball history; in 1866, Poughkeepsie\u2019s Vassar College played host to the first-ever women\u2019s organized baseball team, the Vassar Resolutes.<\/p>\n

Siegel said organizers had their eyes on the long-term sustainability of the WPBL, and hosting the first season in a single location would cut costs and help grow the league.\n<\/p>\n

\u201c\u200aWe\u2019re really focused on getting the first season off the ground so that people can see how much fun it is to watch women play at the highest level,\u201d she said. \u201cBut we certainly have our eye next year on doing much more in the cities that we\u2019re representing.\u201d<\/p>\n

WPBL representatives told amNewYork that the league will announce the two streaming networks where fans can catch the games this week.\n<\/p>\n

Strong enthusiasm may be a positive sign for the league\u2019s future, as many women hope to evolve it into a full-time career.\n<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s been a fun process, and I\u2019m just hoping the league really takes off and I can actually make a career out of it,\u201d Studer said.\n<\/p>\n

Pitcher Jacqui Reynolds, a third-round draft pick out of Massachusetts, told amNewYork that the league\u2019s formation means more than just another season of sports entertainment; it\u2019s a symbol of hope for girls who want to play baseball.<\/p>\n

\u201c\u200aJust being able to say that I\u2019m playing professional baseball was definitely a dream I had as a kid,\u201d Reynolds said. \u201cI know growing up, a lot of people have had that dream. I\u2019m excited to be able to play for fans who also had that dream, and for fans that want to look forward to also having that dream of playing professionally with the younger generation.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"JacquiJacqui Reynolds, 31 Massachusetts, will represent the New York Heights as a pitcher in the upcoming season. Photo: Jaclyn Kalafut via WPBL<\/p>\n

Growing up, Reynolds wasn\u2019t allowed to play baseball, so in high school and college she played softball, a common compromise female players are asked to make. But after she tore her ACL during her college career with Southern New Hampshire University, something Reynolds has referred to as \u201ca blessing in disguise,\u201d she was able to make the shift to baseball.<\/p>\n

She started in 2016 at a women\u2019s baseball camp sponsored by the Boston Red Sox, where she learned of an all-female team called the New England Red Sox. Reynolds tried out and made that team as well as some mens teams. She\u2019s now coaching at the University of Massachusetts in Boston, finishing up her sixth season.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The rivalries between Boston sports teams and New York sports teams are some of the fiercest in history with Red Sox vs. Yankees, Celtics vs. Knicks and Patriots vs. Giants matchups garnering outsized attention in sports viewing.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201c\u200aI\u2019ve been on the Boston side of the rivalry for many years as a fan, so it\u2019s going to be interesting to be on the other side of the rivalry for once playing,\u201d Reynolds said.<\/p>\n

She told amNewYork that her loyal fanbase in Boston wouldn\u2019t let that get in the way of their unwavering support for her.\n<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s going to be a lot of people from Boston rooting for New York,\u201d Reynolds said. \u201cSo that\u2019s going to be a definite change which is going to be funny for my family since we\u2019re all huge Boston sports fans. I know my friends and family are all going to support New York.\u201d<\/p>\n

For those who weren\u2019t initially signed to a roster, the WPBL built out a pipeline of draft picks like 18-year-old Texas native, Abigail Moore, eagerly waiting for their chance to step onto the field. Moore, a New York Heights draft pick who didn\u2019t make the initial roster told amNewYork that she\u2019ll spend this season training and staying ready in the event that a player is injured or otherwise unavailable and she\u2019s called into action.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Moore, a catcher, told amNewYork that the experience of even getting drafted to the New York Heights was surreal. She said that the league allows women, both new to the world of professional baseball and more seasoned players to support and learn from each other.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s just been crazy because these women can relate to you in ways that no one else can,\u201d Moore said. \u201cThey have similar stories, similar struggles.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

She was especially excited at the idea of representing NYC, a city with baseball in its blood.\n<\/p>\n

\u201c\u200aBeing a part of something so much bigger than myself, especially being able to wear New York on my chest and represent it with everything I have, I couldn\u2019t be more proud,\u201d Moore said. \u201cIt seriously is just so cool because you put that jersey on, and you know that you\u2019re not only wearing it for yourself, but you\u2019re wearing it for the city of New York. You know you\u2019re wearing it for all of the young girls out there who have dreams of pursuing the same thing you did.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The inaugural season of the Women\u2019s Professional Baseball League (WPBL), the first all-female, American pro baseball league in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":307505,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[993,9,110954,56,63,65,64,76165,6223,8776],"class_list":["post-307504","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-york-city","tag-baseball","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-heights","tag-ny","tag-nyc","tag-nyc-headlines","tag-nyc-news","tag-nyc-sports","tag-womens-sports","tag-womens-professional-baseball-league"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/307504","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=307504"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/307504\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/307505"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=307504"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=307504"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=307504"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}