Normally during a regulation softball game, there are nine players on the field at a time.
This summer for the AUSL Bandits, there were 10.
On July 31, just three days after helping lead the Bandits to the inaugural AUSL Championship Series against the Talons with her efforts on the mound, Odicci Alexander-Bennett announced via TikTok that she had played the entire season while pregnant.
“Baby Bennett is baking and I can’t wait to meet you,” read the caption of the video, in which she showed off her belly in her blue and white pinstriped Bandits uniform.
To date, the post has received more than 153,000 likes, 3,200 saves and 2,700 shares on TikTok. Alexander-Bennett has received press coverage spanning E! News, to the Miami Herald, to Today.com.
Amidst the hubbub, the 27-year-old softball star, who is married with a 5-year-old stepdaughter, has kept a grounded perspective on why her situation has generated so much buzz.
“You get married, you have kids, right? That’s how I see it,” Alexander-Bennett said.
So why, exactly, has this caught so many people’s attention?
Perhaps because she’s no different from any other woman who becomes pregnant and still shows up to work every day.
With the excitement surrounding the start of the AUSL’s inaugural season on June 7, Alexander-Bennett barely had time to let the dust of Opening Day settle before she found out she was pregnant, though she was not surprised by the news. A huge development in her professional life had collided with a major development in her personal life.
But for Alexander-Bennett, those two areas are linked by softball. Softball is her life. She never seriously considered sitting out the season or asking for any special treatment. AUSL policies allow athletes to play while pregnant if they wish to and are cleared by doctors to do so. If she was healthy, she was going to play.
So play she did, and she was a valuable cog to the Bandits all summer long. Alexander-Bennett went 4-2 with a 3.54 ERA across 13 appearances (three starts), notching 20 strikeouts in 31 2/3 innings. After the Bandits lost in the Championship Series, she played in the AUSL All-Star Cup, which wrapped up on Aug. 31, and had a 4.20 ERA in three outings (one start).
How was she able to accomplish all this while carrying a growing person inside her? For Alexander-Bennett, her pregnancy was a source of immense strength, and she wanted to inspire other women athletes who may be grappling with similar situations in their own lives.
“It was a daily reminder that I wasn’t just playing for myself,” she said. “Strength isn't just about your physical ability or your physical power. It's about resilience, patience and just trusting your body. And I think I've learned that my body is capable of so much more than I have ever imagined.”
Rather than feeling fatigued by her pregnancy, Alexander-Bennett had more energy than ever. She joked that she felt she could “run through a brick wall” while acknowledging that her prenatal vitamins may have been a factor and dismissed the notion that a pregnant woman athlete can’t be competitive.
Though she kept the pregnancy under wraps during the season (only a few coaches and teammates knew), now that the news is out, Alexander-Bennett will soon join the ranks of women athletes who have given birth and returned to compete at an elite level. That list includes fellow AU softball players Danielle Gibson Whorton, Kelsey Stewart-Hunter and Keilani Ricketts. It also includes many prominent women in other sports, including soccer player Alex Morgan, tennis players Serena Williams and Naomi Osaka, WNBA star Candace Parker and track and field’s Allyson Felix and Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce.
Beyond those famous names, there’s a whole world out there of women working to balance their athletic careers (or non-athletic careers) with their desire to be mothers. And even though Alexander-Bennett felt comfortable playing softball while pregnant, she still had to take several on-field precautions to ensure her safety and that of her unborn baby. Sliding on her stomach was out, as was attempting a diving play. There was a risk that a batted ball could hit her in the stomach.
But even taking those factors into consideration, in Alexander-Bennett’s mind, it was always game on.
“Softball is dangerous. I've been playing this game for 20 years,” she said. “It's not like I forgot how to play the game. You get in the car every day, that's dangerous. Walking in the street now, the world is dangerous.
“That's how I saw it. Life is dangerous, the world is dangerous. I’m fine.”
For Alexander-Bennett, the months of her pregnancy are slowly ticking down toward the big day. Her offseason will be spent steeped in softball at SixFour3, the facility she runs in Richmond, Va., to train the next generation of AUSL standouts. She’s also focused on fueling her body as best she can and maintaining her strength through winter. The baby girl is due in January, which will expand her family of three to four. Her doctors have given her a rough estimate that she could return to playing just six weeks after giving birth, if everything goes smoothly.
She wouldn’t have it any other way.