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Alyssa Denham Returns to Softball with AUSL After Battling Life-Changing Injury

Pitcher Alyssa Denham was selected in the AUSL Allocation Draft on Monday night.
Nicole Reitz|
AUSL

Alyssa Denham thought her career was over. 

After debuting with Athletes Unlimited in 2021, the former Arizona ace pitched her way through five seasons, including two Athletes Unlimited X (AUX) competitions in 2022 and 2024. 

Denham made 41 appearances, including 24 starts, with a 2.38 ERA, a 15-3 record, and 73 strikeouts. She became the first player in AU Pro Softball history to earn medalist honors in back-to-back years, finishing second in 2022 and 2023.

A woman in a yellow softball uniform wears a medal around her neck and smiles.
AUSL

But in those last two years, excelling with AU, she was battling something much bigger.

While pitching on a fractured back with a slipped vertebra and herniated disk, absolutely nothing was going to get in the way of Denham taking the mound. 

Not even throwing up in between innings, a numb left leg, or carrying the mental and physical load, strike after strike.  

Denham and her doctors knew the end was near. Two weeks before the start of the 2024 AU season, she received word that if she wanted to save her health, she’d have to have a spinal fusion and a cage put in her lower back. 

If Denham was going to have to hang up the cleats, she was going to give 110 percent no matter what. 

“This season has tested my limits more than ever,” Denham wrote in an Instagram post. “Two weeks before the Athletes Unlimited Championship Season, I received the news no athlete wants to hear. All the hours of training and preparing have taken a toll on my body. I have been struggling and refusing to quit. Softball has made me a competitor for life.” 

Surgery took place shortly after the end of the 2024 AU season, and Denham’s life was forced to look much different. While sporting a back brace and relearning to walk, she knew deep down that if she took it day by day, maybe returning to the field wouldn’t be the craziest idea. 

The Arizona underdog has faced doubts many times before. Why not prove everyone wrong again? 

“People ask me if I am done for good…no, I’m not,” Denham wrote in an Instagram post that featured her taking her first steps after surgery. “It’s going to be hard as hell, but I played at the best university in the country (when no one thought I could), got drafted (when everyone said no way), placed second back-to-back years ( and people are still trying to figure out why I’m effective), and competed on a broken back with a numb left leg (when doctors told me I couldn’t). I’ll be back.” 

It was a long journey with endless hours at physical therapy, but by March of 2025, she was able to jog again at 60 percent, and by April, she was running on a treadmill. By May, she tried throwing during rehab. 

After watching the rest of her former teammates excel during the inaugural season of the Athletes Unlimited Softball League (AUSL) throughout the summer, Denham was officially able to throw bullpens and see field action by the fall. The return to play at the professional level was looking more and more possible for the righty.

So with the announcement of the AUSL expanding, she entered her name among over 100 other players in the Allocation Draft and announced her comeback via social media. 

On Monday night, her dreams of getting back to the field came true. Selected 12th overall by the Volts, Denham will officially make her return in the summer of 2026.

“This has been the hardest year of my life mentally, physically, and emotionally, but I am finally on the other side of the mountain,” Denham wrote on X. “Now a whole new level of work starts. A year ago today, I couldn’t even put my shoes on or hardly walk. TODAY I GOT DRAFTED!” 

The Volts lost two arms in Sam Landry and Payton Gottshall and a veteran leader in Jessi Warren during the Expansion Draft, but regained those attributes through Denham. Ally Carda and Aliyah Binford were also added to the roster, adding excess depth next to Denham. 

Denham’s fight through adversity is certainly inspiring, and her AUSL debut this summer is not one to be missed. 

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Nicole Reitz
NICOLE REITZ

Nicole Reitz graduated from Indiana University Indianapolis with a degree in sports journalism in 2022 and has been writing about softball and baseball since 2018 .Her work has been published in various publications like Softball America, the Indianapolis Star, and SoxOn35th.

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