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Gender equity Denver to hold tryout for women's pro football team
Posted: Friday June 30, 2000 10:51 PM
DENVER (AP) -- Are you ready for some football? Women's professional football? Mirja McDade, a cook at a Denver tavern, and Amy Machin-Ward, a former collegiate soccer player and coach, are convinced they're ready. Both McDade and Machin-Ward can hardly wait for tryouts on July 22 for the Colorado Valkyries, a new franchise in the Women's Professional Football League. The two prospects were among those attending a press conference Friday to introduce the Valkyries, a team so new that acting general manager Mike Monetti has been on the job only three days. The Colorado franchise wasn't expected to begin play until 2001, but the timetable was accelerated. Monetti, also one of five owners of the franchise, said response from prospective players to a recent newspaper article about the new team has been "phenomenal." "There's a lot of women out there who really want to play football, especially on the professional level," Monetti said. "The response has been mind-boggling. I had no idea there would be this kind of interest." What remains to be seen is whether that interest among would-be players will translate into interest among fans, who will have the ultimate say on whether the WPFL succeeds. Compounding the WPFL's problem is the fact there is virtually no talent pool of women's football players from which the league can recruit. "There's no farm system," Monetti noted. "Our women are coming from track and field, soccer, rugby, flag football and field hockey. That's a big hurdle we have to deal with. Our coaches are going to have to do their jobs. "Our league is exactly the same as the NFL, the same rules. The only difference is the ball is a little smaller." Monetti, of Steamboat Springs, plans to have a coaching staff on board in about two weeks. Monetti conceded the new league could benefit from being seen, initially, as a curiosity. If it is to enjoy any longevity, however, it must field an entertaining product. "I believe our athletes are skilled enough," he insisted. Three teams -- the Minnesota Vixens, Lake Michigan Minx and New York Sharks -- competed in a Barnstorming Tour last year to test the marketability and fan interest in women's football. Originally, the league hoped to field six to eight teams for the 2000 season, which will begin play on Oct. 14, but that number has grown. "The confirmed number I received this morning was 14 teams will be playing this season," Monetti said. "So it's doubled from what everybody expected." Players in the WPFL won't be quitting their day jobs just yet. The league has to make money for a profit-sharing plan to kick in for the players. "Basically, we're running on kind of a limited budget," Monetti said. "We're not throwing around NFL type of money with our teams." The Valkyries will play a 14-game schedule, and they hope to sell a modest 1,000 season tickets at $108 apiece. Monetti still is negotiating on a stadium where the team will play. In tryouts by other WPFL teams, as any as 700 players have shown up at one site. That despite the fact that the WPFL is marketing its game as "full-contact, knock-down, drag-out, bleeding football," according to Monetti. Such a description isn't scaring off McDade, Machin-Ward or other prospective players, who include a lawyer, a police officer, a NASA scientist and mothers. "I dig sports," said McDade. "I've played baseball, softball, volleyball and basketball, and this is where I want to be -- in sports." Since moving to Denver about a year ago, McDade has joined a group of young men in a weekly tackle football game at City Park. "I get taken down just like the guys," she said. "I love it. I'll be at the tryouts, guaranteed." McDade has begun a rigorous running program to get herself into playing shape. "It's been a few years since high school," she said. Asked her height and weight, she said, "Five-nine and a half, and we'll just say I'm a little bit over 250." If she makes the team, she promises to bring a following to Valkyries games. "I'm guaranteeing at least a whole bar's worth of people coming over," she said. Machin-Ward, who played soccer at North Carolina and who coached the men's soccer team at Regis University for eight years before resigning recently, has a 3-month-old son, Sam, and a devoted husband who helps care for the child. "Since I had my little one, I've maybe been looking for something new," she said. "When I saw the article, I thought, 'Wow, what a kick in the pants to get a chance to do something like that.' I've always really enjoyed the game of football, and I'm a student of the game. "I'd like to try to play quarterback. If they ask people to play both ways, I kind of have a linebacker mentality, but I'm not sure if I have the size for it. "I think there are enough women in Denver like me. I think people will come to watch it initially to see what it looks like. Then when they see that people are hitting and there are some good skills being demonstrated, I think they'll come back. This will be a good family game, something where you can take your kids and it doesn't cost an arm and a leg."
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