SAN JUAN, PUERTO RICO — Former Major League Baseball star Brandon Phillips, best known for his standout career with the Cincinnati Reds and nicknamed DatDudeBP, is now the owner of the Atlanta Smoke, a professional women’s softball team. As part of his commitment to giving his players unique opportunities, Phillips regularly takes the team to new destinations so they can compete in different environments and experience new cultures.
He recently brought the team to Puerto Rico to open the league’s first games in the Caribbean and play in San Juan’s Hiram Bithorn stadium.
The Puerto Rican women’s national softball team and the Atlanta Smoke are facing off in a series of exhibition games this week at Hiram Bithorn stadium in San Juan, Puerto Rico – Image Credit: Latino Sports
When Phillips learned that Puerto Rico’s women’s national softball team was ranked third in the world, he arranged a series of exhibition games between the Atlanta Smoke and the Puerto Rican national team before the scheduled league games.
The matchups not only offered high-level competition but also helped showcase and promote women’s softball on an international stage.
Prior to the first exhibition game, I had the opportunity to sit down with Phillips to discuss his passion for the sport, his vision for the Atlanta Smoke, and the significance of bringing his team to Puerto Rico.
The following is a transcript of our conversation.
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BP – My name is Brandon Phillips, the owner of the best team in the world, that’s who I am. I’m the owner of the best team in the world—the Atlanta Smoke. I was a former major league second baseman, All Star, Silver Slugger, Gold Glove, in the Reds Hall of Fame and today, I am here in Puerto Rico with my team, the best women’s softball team in the world.
LS – And you chose to be in Puerto Rico. I asked myself, why is a brother who’s developing something in the mainland, United States with such a great team, what made you want to come down to Puerto Rico?
BP – I like doing things that’s never been done before. Last year we played in the Bahamas, and it was an epic time. It was very beautiful, they really took care of us. Shout out to them. Then I said, man what else can I do that’s different and one of our GM’s—his name is Eric Mays and he’s Puerto Rican. He said, Brandon have you ever thought about going to Puerto Rico? I said, hell yeah, I thought about it, can I do it and then he says, I can make it happen. He reached out to a lot of former and some present players like Francisco Lindor and a lot of guys that we played against and a lot of people that we all look up to like Roberto Alomar, he’s one of the best, if not the best second baseman that I look up to. We’ve been in contact with him and he said, man if you can bring your team here, we can make a lot of things happen. That was all I needed to hear. I said, I get our team here and you guys take care of everything else, I’ll make it happen and I brought the best team in the world, a three-peat team, with a back-to-back-to-back record. We are champions in the world of women’s softball.
LS – A lot of people don’t know much about female professional softball games. I mean it’s not something that you see covered frequently by so-called corporate sports news channels that don’t give us all the real sports news. How does the league work?
BP – We do play in a league, but I like to think beyond the traditional format. I want to take this team around the world. We’ve played in Mexico City and the Bahamas, and now we’re in Puerto Rico. Next year, we might play in the Dominican Republic—you never know where we’ll go next. So far, we’ve won everywhere we’ve played, and I want to see what we can do on a global stage. I’d even take this team to Japan if I had to. I love doing things that haven’t been done before, and I want us to compete against the best teams everywhere. I don’t want to limit us, and the players love it. I treat them like Major League Baseball players, and they love the atmosphere and everything they get to experience. Everything I learned during my career, I try to pass on to them with the same respect and support.
LS – So is this a professional league?
BP – Yes, it’s a professional and these girls get paid to play. Yes, they get paid, they get paid a lot of money. The better you are, the more money you make. That’s how it works.
LS – That’s how it works?
BP – Yes, that’s how it works. Just like Major League Baseball but they have wigs on. (We both laugh). I mean you know what I’m saying they’re just women, just women that play softball and they’re the best. They’re the best in the world and it’s a lot of fun watching it. I like watching the fast pitched softball more than I watch MLB.
LS – Now let me ask you a question? My sister was a good softball player, but that was just for fun. There were no opportunities back then for females who loved playing softball. For people who don’t know much about women’s softball, what can you tell us?
BP – Wow! Very amazing to watch if nobody really watched fast pitch women’s softball. Treat yourself because you are missing out. I mean it’s the tempo, it’s amazing. I mean the girls are very talented. I fell in love with softball. At first, I thought it was something that I would never watch but once I went to a game—thank you Lauren Chamberlain for really opening my eyes and softball. I said I’m in love; this is something I want to invest in, and I want to keep on going and see how far we can go.
LS – You were a star second baseman in the major leagues. After baseball, what led you to women’s softball?
BP – It just happened, you know and it just became something I just fell in love with. My sister played softball in high school but there was no league for her to go play in, so she had to put that down and fall in love with another sport. I got this opportunity to really do this. I was thinking how there’s a lot of girls out there who never had the chance to really prolong their career after college and so now if you look at it like this could have been my sister now being able to play softball instead of playing basketball because she loves softball so much more. Now I’m just investing in softball, now when girls are leaving college, they got somewhere else they can go afterwards and it’s professional softball.
LS- So you decide to come to Puerto Rico. Somebody tells you about playing some games prior to your league games with a team from Puerto Rico that happens to be ranked third in the world and you didn’t know that. So, what needs to happen to grow this sport?
BP – Hey man, it’s called investing in something that you love. I’m not going to tell anybody to do anything. Just watch and learn and watch how amazing this sport is and how people making this game grow. That’s all you can do is invest in what you love and just watch it grow.
LS – So what do you think needs to happen to make the corporate news media and sports news media televise these games and help promote them?
BP – Us playing the Puerto Rican national team, this should be seen and it will through us as this is live it’s on our YouTube channel. It’s on our live feed right now, on our Youtube Channel/@TheAtlantaSmoke. You can go watch it right now. You can log on now and watch them do the introductions as we speak.
LS – Well I’m going to make sure that we in Latino Sports will help promote your visit here and what you are doing with women’s softball. Tell me about your team.
BP – My team is majority black. That speaks for itself a lot of other teams don’t have that black mix. I mean, I’m just saying it’s not just to have people that look like me being on the team. I mean there are a lot of people that don’t really get that opportunity. If you look around at other rosters and other teams, they might not have one woman of color. I have them all on one team and we go out there whipping everybody else and this is what it’s about because people that look like me can play this game. When I played in the major leagues, black players were disappearing every year. But now, I could play people that look like me on a one-on-one platform and go out there and perform because it’s the same thing in softball as Major League Baseball. The thing is I don’t have people on my team just because they looked like me. They are on the team because they can play.
LS – How do you recruit?
BP – I mean you got to do research. Looking at the colleges and I see what all they doing and if there is a sister who plays regardless of what she looks like, if she is a baller and they can come play for me, I don’t care about the names. I don’t care if they are from a big college. It’s all about picking the right players. You don’t pick the best players, you pick the right players for your organization and that’s how you win.
LS – When you told these young ladies that they were going to Puerto Rico to play, what was their reaction?
BP – Puerto Rico? They lost it! They said, OMG, he is doing it again. A lot of them have never been to Puerto Rico and guess what, I’m the person that got to make that happen. That is something that they’ll never forget for the rest of their lives.
LS – Absolutely, I want to wish you luck and know that we in Latino Sports are here to help promote what you’re doing.
BP – Thank you.
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