Chicago Bandits Sign Morgan Foley

Fresh off a stellar four-year career with Division 2 powerhouse Indianapolis, ace pitcher Morgan Foley has signed with the Chicago Bandits.

(c) UIndy Sports Info

The dominant hurler is UIndy's all-time wins leader and will be the first Division 2 player to ever suit up for the Bandits, who are coming off a league championship in 2015 and looking to shore up their rotation and pitching staff following the departure of all-time great Monica Abbott this offseason.

During her career at UIndy, Foley set three school records including wins (140), strikeouts (1,659), and innings pitched (1027). She registered eight career no-hitters.

Foley is second all-time in Division II history in strikeouts, behind only fellow 2016 NPF rookie Hannah Perryman, who was drafted by the Akron Racers. Foley got the "W" in the duo's only true head-to-head matchup this season, registering eighteen strikeouts and allowing just one hit and two runs in the conference tournament against Perryman's UMSL squad.

For 2016, Foley finished the season with a 40-4 record and 0.85 ERA. She collected 487 strikeouts in 272 innings of work. She allowed just twenty-one extra base hits and opponents hit just .133 against her. Throughout her entire career, Foley never allowed opponents to hit higher than .166 against her.

Also on the strikeout front, Foley holds the NCAA record for most strikeouts in a single game with thirty, a record she set in a thirteen-inning affair.

Monica Abbot Signs Six-Year Deal w/ Scrap Yard Dawgs

Monica Abbott, widely considered the best active pitcher in the game, has signed a six-year free-agent contract, a "million-dollar deal", with the Scrap Yard Dawgs, the newest expansion team in the National Pro Fastpitch league.

Abbott, 30, has pitched for the Chicago Bandits for the last five seasons, and the Dawgs will be her fifth NPF team overall since entering the league in 2007. She took the 2008 season off to participate in the Olympics as a member of Team USA.

A Tennessee Lady Vol from 2004-2007, Abbott cemented her status as the program's living legend when she ended her career with 189 career wins, an ERA of 0.79, and 2,440 career strikeouts. She ended her collegiate career as the NCAA's all-time leader in six categories, including wins, strikeouts, shutouts, and innings pitched, among others. She was named the National Player of the Year in 2007.

Abbott led the NPF in 2015 with an 0.31 ERA and her thirteen wins were second in the league. She allowed only thirty-two hits in 90.1 innings of work, striking out 149 over the same period of time. Her dominance was integral in the Bandits' taking home the Cowles Cup as the league champions.

The six-year deal is structured interestingly to fit within the league's $150,000 salary cap. Abbott's base salary will annually be $20,000, with the rest of the $1,000,000 sum being filled through various bonuses based on attendance numbers. The league's attendance fluctuate based on many different factors, including at various venues, but various news outlets have reported a minimum of 100 fans in attendance triggers many of the bonuses, as do several other factors.

Abbott will turn thirty-seven in the midst of the final year of the contract, which stretches to 2021. As Graham Hays of ESPNW noted, the deal seems to be particularly structured toward allowing Abbott's return to international competition should softball be re-allowed into the Olympics for the 2020 Games in Tokyo.

The signing makes Abbott the fourth former Lady Vol to join the Dawgs for their first season of play, joining fellow former Tennessee stars Ivy & Ellen Renfroe and Madison Shipman.

The timing of the contract's announcement is interesting, as well, as the Bandits had placed the franchise tag on Abbott to allow for exclusive negotiation up to the tag's expiration on May 1. That the contract with such intricately-woven language would be finalized in such a short period of time is intriguing. The Dawgs will have to forfeit their 2017 first-round draft selection to the Bandits due to signing the tagged player.

Where Are They Now: Maggie Hull

Who is she? Maggie Hull, a former all-American outfielder and record holder for the Kansas Jayhawks.

(c) Kansas Athletics

What is she known for? Hull was an outfield stalwart and a steady bat in the lineup for four years at KU.... in her senior season, she led three statistical categories and ranked in the top ten in six others. Upon her graduation, she held the Jayhawk program's career batting average record as well as the single-season mark of .456 among others. She was three times named to the all-conference team;  twice all-region; and finally was awarded all-American honors in her senior season of 2013. Following her senior season, she joined the Chicago Bandits of the NPF as their 11th-overall selection in the 2013 draft.

Here's something interesting... At KU, Maggie played all four years with her twin sister, Rosie. The identical twins were both outfielders and were named to the Academic all-Big 12 First Team each of the final three years of their careers... Maggie also is a writer and runs her own website, "Competing for His Glory". Her site contains first-hand takes on many aspects from Maggie's life, including as a student-athlete, pro athlete, coach, wife, and Christian.

Quotable quote: "In my post-playing life, I try to commit fully and whole-heartedly to any task at hand, not letting the fear of failure paralyze me, yet embracing the process and knowing that God uses the hard times and the failures to refine me, mature me, and transform me into the woman that He created me to be."

What's she up to now? After her playing career ended following her rookie season with the Bandits, Maggie is back in Lawrence, home of the Jayhawks. Now Maggie Hull-Tietz following her marriage, she and her husband Kevin are part of the Young Life College ministry at KU. Kevin is a full-time staff member while Maggie works in a variety of roles and right now is a volunteer.

In addition to her ministry opportunities, Maggie works part-time as a TV Analyst for ESPN3.com and other networks and recently accepted the position of Director of Softball Operations for the Jayhawks softball team, a job she’ll start on June 1^st of this year!

Keep up: You can find Maggie on Twitter @maggietietz or via her website, competingforhisglory.com

Did You Know: Sara Moulton

Pitcher Sara Moulton on the left; 

Sara Moulton is one of the Minnesota Golden Gophers' all-time program greats; an all-American who ended her college career with more than a half-dozen program records, including 112 career wins; 1,184 strikeouts, and five no-hitters. In her senior season, 2014, Moulton went 27-8 with a 1.97 ERA. Following the season, she was drafted by the Chicago Bandits of the NPF at #5 overall, a pitching staff she is still a member of to this day.

Did you know there is another famous Sara Moulton? A television chef, having hosted three programs on the Food Network as one of the channel's first big-names, Sara the chef currently hosts a cooking program that is distributed by public television, as well as writes a syndicated column for the Associated Press.