Palacios slides into home plate.

How We Play: Softball

© Athletes Unlimited, LLC 2020 / Credit: Jade Hewitt

How We Score

Win Points

Win points are all about the team performance. They accumulate during both individual innings and overall game wins. Each inning is worth +10 points and overall games are worth +50 points.

If an inning is tied, the points roll over to the subsequent inning.

Game MVPs

After each game, the players and members of The Unlimited Club will vote for three players who they feel had standout performances.

These points will be added to the player’s individual total. Points will be awarded as follows:

MVP 1: +60 points
MVP 2: +40 points
MVP 3: +20 points

Individual Stats

The final component of points is individual stats. Position players and pitchers will earn points based on their performance.

Offensive Points

The breakdown for individual points is as follows:

  • Single: +10 points
  • Double: +20 points
  • Triple: +30 points
  • Home run: +40 points
  • Stolen base: +10 points
  • Caught Stealing: -10 points
  • Base on balls: +8 points
  • HBP: +8 points
  • Sacrifice Fly/Bunt: +10

If a batter goes 3-for-5 with two singles and a home run, but is caught stealing, they will be awarded 50 points.

10 (S) + 10 (S) + 40 (HR) – 10 (CS) = 50 points

Pitching Points

Pitchers earn +4 points for every out and -10 points for each earned run allowed.

For example, if a pitcher throws 5 2/3 innings and allows one earned run, they would earn 58 points.

(17 x 4) – (1 ER x 10) = 58 points

A player’s points determine their ranking, which will be used each week for the draft.

What about extra innings?

In extra innings, no player earns individual points and there are no additional win points to be earned per inning – only those that have rolled over.

For example, if all seven innings were tied and the game took nine innings to decide a winner, only 70 points, plus win points, would be awarded.

 

How We Draft

After the last game of every week, the top four point scorers will be named team captains. Each captain will be assigned to a team color based on their standing.
No. 1: Gold
No. 2: Orange
No. 3: Blue
No. 4: Purple

Team captains can consult with anyone they want prior to the opening of the draft, including any Athletes Unlimited staff, former coaches, and teammates.

Each week during the draft every captain will be allowed up to two minutes per pick. Once a player is selected their captain may consult them for further decisions. Once all 60 players have been selected to a team, it will be time to prepare for the upcoming slate of games and get ready to play ball.

Then, an exciting new week of competition will begin.

 

Whitepaper: Applying Athletes Unlimited Softball Scoring to MLB Baseball: Team Parity and Individual Performance

Traditional scoring systems run on a strict win/loss system. The Athletes Unlimited scoring system allocates points to the winner of each inning as well as to the winner of the game overall. It also allocates points to individual players based on offensive plays and their degree of impact on the game. This means even the losing team has a chance to earn points, and a player on a losing team is still rewarded. Our data team applied our scoring system to Major League Baseball data from the 2019 season and found that the Athletes Unlimited scoring system has greater team parity in the league and aligns with conventional measures of individual performance.

 

Read more about the in-depth study and simulations

Whitepaper: Parity in Athletes Unlimited Softball

Traditional scoring systems in similarly scored sports simply count the number of wins and attempt to address team disparity by offering the worst performing team the highest draft pick, or some random-based variation of that. The Athletes Unlimited system essentially does away with fixed teams by redrafting every roster every week, producing greater team parity and highlighting individual parity. Our data team ran simulations to ensure these goals were accomplished by our scoring system.

 

Read more about the in-depth study and simulations