The Cali Condors have opened the book on the International Swimming League’s 30 day free agency signing period with the addition of 25-year old Kathrin Demler to their roster.
The Condors, like all ISL teams, will have 30 days to fill out their 28-36 swimmer roster for the coming season. The defending league champions selected 27 athletes in the ISL Draft earlier this week, like most of the league’s teams. The teams will be allowed to bring up to 32 swimmers to any one phase of the season, though they can have up to 36 swimmers on their roster – which will be used by top teams for top swimmers who don’t want to participate in the regular season but are available for the semi-final and final rounds.
Demler, who is German but was an NCAA All-American and Big Ten Champion at Ohio State, represented DC Trident in the 2020 ISL season. There, she scored 23.75 MVP points in the regular season, which ranked her 210th in the league – a similar ranking to the Condors’ final-round draft pick Kevin Cordes and a higher rank than Cali’s penultimate draft pick Sherridon Dressel.
While she’s best known internationally as a 200 butterflier, Demler spent most of last season swimming middle-distance freestyle races for the Trident, which included a pair of 4th-place finishes in the 400 free. She also picked up a 4th-place finish in the 200 fly in her lone entry in that event during the season.
She was Jackpotted in 4 of her 11 individual swims, and also raced as part of DC’s 400 free relay on three occasions – something she won’t be called to do as often for Cali.
Her best times in the 200 free, 400 free, and 200 fly in short course all came during the last ISL season.
Best Times, SCM:
- 100 free – 57.54 (Relay split – 55.16)
- 200 free – 1:57.90
- 400 free – 4:06.38
- 200 back – 2:09.11
- 200 IM – 2:10.49
- 400 IM – 4:39.37
While most athletes are being paid the same base salary this season, the move will mean a substantial pay jump for Demler because of the much-larger team bonuses that the Condors will earn for a projected top league finish. While the draft did serve some balancing benefit, the free agency period will again benefit the top teams because of the large team bonuses available.
Teams have 30 days to fill out their rosters, after which time, the rosters are presumed to be complete. The regular season will begin on August 26 in Naples, Italy.
Cali’s 2021 ISL Roster So Far:
| Swimmer |
| Kelsi Dahlia |
| Beata Nelson |
| Molly Hannis |
| Justin Ress |
|
Coleman Stewart
|
| Marcin Cieslak |
|
Kacper Machjrzak
|
| Hali Flickinger |
| Erika Brown |
| Natalie Hinds |
| Nic Fink |
| Olivia Smoliga |
| Townley Haas |
| Lilly King |
| Caeleb Dressel |
| Maike de Waard |
| Eddy Wang |
| Brodie Williams |
| Oleg Kostin |
|
Alexandr Krasnykh
|
| Leonie Kullman |
| Emily Escobedo |
| Jesse Puts |
| Mark Szaranek |
|
Sherridon Dressel
|
| Khadar Baqlah |
| Kevin Cordes |
| Kathrin Demler |
Angel (Jose) Martinez from Mexico just signed with the Cali Condors
I’m just going to keep doing this until you acknowledge more free agency stuff lol
Isabella Hindley from Great Britain just signed with DC Trident
New York Breakers just released who they added from free agency
They are at 31 swimmers, only 1 more till their teams full. 15 girls & 16 boys, I think they’ll even it out & add a girl
also Mark Nikolaev just re-signed with DC Trident too! 🙂