Kim Ng on Getting Rejected in Public, and Saying Yes to Softball

On stage: Kim Ng, commissioner, Athletes Unlimited Softball League · Moderator: Rachel Axon, Sports Business Journal

Kim Ng interviewed for general manager jobs for years before the Miami Marlins hired her in 2020, making her the first woman to serve as GM of a men's team in major North American sports. She said the rejection itself wasn't the hard part. Sports is full of it.

"I think the tough thing was the publicness of it," she said. Her staff would tiptoe around her, unsure what to say. The media kept writing the story, which put her life on display. And some interviews, she suspected, weren't even real.

The Zoom with Jeter

The Marlins opportunity came when word reached her that Derek Jeter, then running the club, wanted to talk. She asked to keep it quiet; she didn't need to read her name in the paper again. When she got on Zoom with Jeter, she decided to throw everything out there.

When the job came through, she said, she didn't spike the ball. Mostly she felt relief, and thought about the women who would come after her. She had prepared for it by working for four first-time general managers, including the Yankees' Brian Cashman, learning what to watch for along the way.

Building the pipeline by asking

When she started with the Marlins, she said, the club's data analytics internship drew 300 applicants. Three were women, and she had to talk two of them into applying. The next year, she said, far more women applied. She pointed to Eve Rosenbaum, now with the Orioles, as a former intern in a department she ran.

Her approach to the job, she said, was built on relationships at every level of an organization, from entry-level scouts to ownership, and on understanding how to communicate with each of them.

Why softball

After leaving the Marlins, Ng had friends over for dinner during the NCAA women's basketball tournament. They told her she had to watch Caitlin Clark. After more than 30 years buried in baseball, she said, it was eye-opening.

Athletes Unlimited had been on her radar since 2019, when she was introduced to its co-founders, Jon Patricof and Jonathan Soros. She liked the principles they built it on, starting with care for the athletes. AU's Player Executive Committee meets with players every week, she said, "giving them a voice and a seat at the table."

She wasn't looking for a full-time job. Patricof told her the sport needed a transformational leader and asked her to think about all the young women she could help. After about six conversations, she came out of retirement, drawn by the moment women's sports is having. She became AUSL commissioner in 2025.

The Coach's Board take

Ng's internship numbers are the youth sports pipeline problem in miniature: 300 applicants, three women, and two of them needed a nudge. Her fix was personal and simple. She asked. The next coach, official or club director in your program may just need someone to tell her to apply.