MLC’s first weekend is in the books, and it feels safe to say the league has knocked it for a solid four runs over cover, with some teams providing great entertainment and other teams looking grateful everyone turned up in the same colored jersey. The pitches have produced runs and challenged the bowlers to adapt, and now games have begun to swing back toward the bowlers as they become more selective on when to go full. The boundaries and the scenery, despite the vacant Mt. Davis at one end, have been surreal and fun.
You know who’s really having fun? The San Francisco Unicorns. There are billboards aplenty in the Bay and they have even teamed up with BART to help promote getting to and from the games. They’re getting the marketing of a true home team right, and the crowds for their games have reflected that despite not threatening the 12,000 capacity MLC prepared for.
Overall, the first four days of MLC have been good. It’s just good to have domestic cricket back on a big national platform.
1. San Francisco
When I wrote my preseason poll over the week leading up to the season, I felt like the Unicorns had a shot to win a title and definitely felt they were a safe pick to be in the final, but I underestimated just how put-together this team really was.
Their top order smashed their way through the first two games with Finn Allen’s world record-setting performance on opening day against Washington with 19 sixes, and the Unicorns cruised against LA; then, when their top order faltered against New York on Sunday night, Xavier Bartlett delivered the highest white ball score of his career in any format with a glorious 59* to lift the Unicorns to a three wicket win when they looked down and out. Haris Rauf is a fire-breathing dragon with Bartlett, Couch, and Carmi Le Roux lurking in the pace mix, as well, and Hassan Khan has taken wickets (albeit expensively) with spin and knocked some great shots around with the bat. They’re by far the most complete team in the league this season and have capitalized on having a true home field.
Player of the Week: Finn Allen. Yes, even after his 13 on Sunday getting himself out on an “excuse me” swing toward backward point. Allen has been a force of nature in the first leg of the season, more than doubling up Devon Conway as the leading run scorer in MLC thus far despite that disappointing innings Sunday night. The ball can fly in Grand Prairie, and Allen will be back.
2. Texas
The Super Kings have been a little underwhelming in getting their four points off New York and Los Angeles, posting 185 and 181 on pitches that have produced scores well into the 200s, but they did get four points. The good news is, their bowling has been more than able to make those relatively low totals stand up, and Noor Ahmad continued to show why he’s such a sought-after player across the world with a four’fer against LA on Sunday. And there’s reason to believe TSK will get better: Marcus Stoinis arrived in San Francisco on Sunday afternoon and could be a huge shot in the arm for the batting lineup that still leaves me unconvinced, but perhaps less-unconvinced than than their peers.
Player of the Week: Adam Milne. I wanted to know where the pace was going to come from for TSK, and the answer is the New Zealand white ball veteran who has been outstanding in his first two outings and was not announced as a signing - he just showed up in the playing XI and started taking wickets. He took 3 for 22 runs against New York and then a phenomenal 2 for 8 against LAKR in 3.1 overs, one of the best spells we’ll see this season in MLC especially factoring in his presence in the power play. Milne and Noor give this team some real weapons and create depth from the top in the bowling attack.
3. Washington
It would have been easy to write the Freedom off as bad after game one, but I wasn’t sold on that - I felt like they simply didn’t have a game plan for bowling that suited the conditions. Too many fuller deliveries teed Finn Allen up for history, and the way their bowlers handled Seattle reinforced that. Ian Holland took four wickets hovering around that nebulous back-of-a-length area on the pitch that constitutes such a dangerous area for T20 batters because of the temptation to play the ball in the air. Short of having the flamethrower pace to blow the ball right by batters, Washington needed to adapt and did that to get two points from Seattle, and their bats, despite missing their title-anchoring opening partnership from last year, look to be settling in. Count a Ricky Ponting-led team out at your own peril.
Player of the Week: Rachin Ravindra. It’s tempting to pull the trigger on Ian Holland here because Ravindra will probably be in this space a lot over the next few weeks, but if he remains consistently in the mid-40s with the bat, Washington has a bat to build around at the top, something they’ll be missing most of the summer with Steve Smith now unlikely to make his two-game cameo.
4. New York
So much for preseason favorites.
The team I had atop my preseason rankings in MLC lost two key players before the games even started with the absences of Rashid Khan and Azmatullah Omarzai, the impact of which was underscored by their remaining Afghanistan bowler, Naveen-ul-Haq, being the team’s most consistent player through the first two games.
But the big guns aren’t all firing for this team, with new captain Nicholas Pooran’s stay at the crease in both matches being upsettingly short, Trent Boult lacking the menace he had once Bumrah came back for Mumbai in the spring, and Agni Chopra yet to deliver on the hype. Kieron Pollard has been useful with the bat but miserable with the ball (let’s not talk about his running).
Player of the Week: Naveen-ul-Haq. Pickings are slim here, but Naveen has been a genuine threat to take wickets every time he touches the ball. He baited Finn Allen into a bad swing early and got Sanjay Krishnamurthi in the power play as well and Saiteja Mukkamalla against Texas. He’s putting pressure on the batters - pressure this team isn’t sustaining in other areas, but he’s still exciting to watch. That’ll have to do.
5. Los Angeles
A picture is worth a thousand words, so here’s one from Peter Della Penna, who had the perfect angle on Saturday:

[Sidebar: PDP did an awesome job of documenting the fans new and old that came out to the Coliseum over the last few days and you should check out his socials to see just how wide the demographics were over the weekend.]
LA’s bats were uninspiring, the bowlers were back-breakingly expensive - Shadley van Schalkwyk took three wickets but gave up 50 runs - and it didn’t look like much of an organized effort in the season-opening blowout loss to San Francisco. Then they got bowled out for an abysmal 124 where van Schalkwyk was the high scorer with 27. Andre Russell looks like he’s done, Matthew Tromp is still on the learning curve, and Unmukt Chand can’t score enough runs to keep this team afloat. It feels like this group has a lot of players going through the motions, and it could get worse before it gets better.
Player of the Week: Tanveer Sangha. The Aussie leg spinner didn’t bowl his full allotment against San Francisco but might have kept at least some of the 19 runs Tromp coughed up off the board. He was effective against Texas, taking a pair of wickets for a reasonable amount of runs. It’s tough to say it will matter much if Russell continues to hemorrhage runs with the ball at the other end, but it’s always nice to see young guys shine.
6. Seattle
Woof.
Do I need more? Do you want more? Of this team?
Seattle has solved exactly zero of its problems from the last-place team last year. David Warner has plenty left in the tank and frankly looked extremely fit in the field in addition to his time with the bat. Kyle Mayers looked the part with the bat, though he gave most of that back with the ball in a 20-run first over. The middle order is still a complete lottery ticket, and Sikandar Raza had one of the worst outings of his or anyone’s T20 career, capped by a soft liner to backward point on the final ball of Seattle’s flaccid 145.
Their pace attack was also brutal, with Mayers, Jessy Singh, and Cameron Gannon getting shelled. Obed McCoy looked decent in that he didn’t hand out runs like full-sized candy at Halloween, and Waqar Salamkheil gave Washington’s middle order fits, but there’s a lot of work to do to get this team anywhere close to the thick of the fight.
Player of the Week: David Warner. I really wanted to bag on the Orcas for signing a 38 year old when they espoused a long-term building process, but Warner was a breath of fresh air in an otherwise moribund innings for Seattle. He played an aesthetically pleasing innings with good shot selection and was also handy as a ground fielder. He probably isn’t in The Best Shape of His Life, but he looks like he has stayed fit and wants to keep playing. He will be a bright spot for a team that will need something to cheer for.
Thanks so much for reading Stumps & Stripes! I hope you’re enjoying the work I do, and I encourage you to subscribe to the newsletter so I get a better sense of what my audience wants to read as I put all of the pieces of this together. It is free, and the plan is for it to remain that way. If you enjoyed this piece, here’s one I wrote over the weekend about Ayan Desai, his development with the Orcas, and the future of the US pace attack:
Bring Me Ayan Desai
For all its faults and criticisms, I genuinely enjoy Major League Cricket. It's doing so much for the sport in the US that USAC does not have the resources to accomplish on its own, including an opportunity for elite American players to sharpen their skills against players from ICC Full Members, be they established vets of the US national team setup or …
Coming up this week:
TUESDAY: What Saiteja Mukkamalla’s ascension means for domestic cricket
THURSDAY: Final thoughts on the inaugural Oakland adventure for MLC 2025
FRIDAY: Associate cricket is a mess… and some ideas on how to fix it