Ohio State Alumni Spotlight: Softball Star Lilli Piper (Part 2)

Lilli Piper is one of Ohio State’s most legendary softball players during the program’s most successful era. She will play with Athletes Unlimited in their inaugural season after NPF chose to forgo a 2020 season. Part Two of our interview examines the tumultuous past months for the sport, and the next frontier of women’s sports. She also examines having a former Buckeye teammate joining her in NPF. And don't forget to check out part one!

BuckeyesNow: Describe the past twelve months without professional softball as an outlet for someone who lives and breathes the sport:

Lilli Piper: It’s quiet. It sucks because not a lot of people get to say they get to play a game for a living. Which obviously I don’t. But for me it’s exciting to be able to take that break from the real world and having a real job and things like that to be able to go play softball. And that’s what I did as my career. It’s just now coming back around, it’s almost like new again, it’s exciting, it’s being able to do something that hasn’t been done for a while.

BN: How excited are you to begin Athletes Unlimited’s inaugural season on August 30 in Chicago:

LP: I’m just excited to be able to go back and play softball. Especially with everything being canceled, I’m just blessed to have the opportunity to still get to play.

"It's new, it's exciting, it's intriguing, and people are going to watch softball in a whole different light."https://t.co/jWjhvNGsKi
— Softball America (@SoftbalAmerica) August 9, 2020

BN: Athletes Unlimited has a unique business model, offering equity and profits to players, and an even more unique scoring system. What do you think of their approach and ambition to change the landscape of women’s sports in America?

LP: Well they’re trying to make it work. It’s kind of showing that right now, especially professional sports for women, isn’t really working. It’s not getting the recognition it should be. So I think they’re trying to change it – make it more exciting, and fun, and different. They’ve done a lot of research on certain aspects of this game – and it’s shown that a lot of people follow players and not teams. What better way to make that happen than playing in different areas with different people than to just switch up the teams every week.

The way that our individual point system is, you still get more points for team wins, winning innings and things like that. I think they didn’t want to make it individual oriented, but did want to give us points to where it could boost us. They don’t want to take it away from the team aspect of the game, but they’re trying to do something to where it’s both.

BN: You were selected by the Cleveland Comets in the third round of the 2019 NPF Draft, one pick before your college roommate and fellow All-Big Ten infielder Emily Clark. Describe your first professional season together:

LP: It's an athletes' dream come true. I was playing with Emily since we were 16. We’ve gotten to do it all together to say the least in the sports aspect and life. Ups and downs of being a 16-year-old, but also every up and down of being a 22-year-old. Having someone by your side that you trust is amazing in that perspective.

"Pipe Bomb" by Lilli Piper of the @CometsNPF - 3-1 Cleveland Comets over the @ShougangEagles in the bottom of the 1st inning #NPF2019 @FloSoftball @OhioStateSB @PiperSwiper pic.twitter.com/7UBUKJ4Jes
— NationalProFastpitch (@profastpitch) July 20, 2019

But to also grow as softball players. We started at a young age playing the game, but when you turn 16, you start to learn more of the mental and fine-tuning side of things, instead of the fundamental things. Obviously, those are important, but as a 16, 17, 18-year-old, you’re starting to realize you’re going to college, you’re playing at the next level. It’s more important that you start to fine tune the mental and tweaking the smaller things instead of the bigger parts of the game. We just grew together and understood how we played the game, and it’s kind of why we bounced off each other. Not a lot of people can say they played travel ball, college, and pro together. That’s absolutely amazing.Photo Gallery

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