Women baseball players pitch skills to high school students

They can hit. They can run. And man, can they pitch.

As four women from the North American Women's Baseball League's North Shore Lady Spirit team spoke to classes at the Watertown High School last Friday, the crowd was a tough sell at first. But as the women demonstrated their skills and taught some incredulous players that they could play ball, too, skepticism turned to awe.

"She's good," a student shouted from the crowd as the snap of baseballs echoed in their gloves.

"It's fantastic," D.J. Leonard, 17, said. "I thought only girls pitched underhand, so that surprised me." Leonard, who plays basketball at the high school, said he liked the presentation, which erased some of the notions that girls couldn't play ball.

During their presentation, Robin Wallace, executive director of NAWBL, based in Lynn, explained that women started playing the game in the 19th century. It wasn't until the mid-1990s, however, that a woman first pitched in a men's collegiate baseball game. It was sanctioned as an official sport by the Amateur Athletic Union in 2002.

Wallace told the students that the most typical stereotype is throwing "like a girl," but said that girls who are coached correctly can learn to throw overhand.

"Girls don't have to throw 'like girls,'" she said. The women explained that men usually pitch somewhere around 90 miles per hour, but women can pitch in the high 70s or 80 miles per hour.

Through drills and contests for tickets, the students learned some of the fundamentals from the women, such as catching ground balls, pitching and catching.

Physical education and health coordinator Donna Ruseckas said the presentation was "a great way to expose a lot of students to professional women's baseball," something they might have not had the opportunity to experience otherwise.

The women spoke to multiple classes throughout the day.

The NAWBL used to be known as the New England Women's Professional Baseball League. Now, the organization has four leagues and an all-star team, the Lady Spirit, based out of the North Shore, Wallace said. Games are played at Fraser Field in Lynn.

Wallace started playing baseball with "the boys" when she was 5 years old, and went on to play in college and professionally before becoming the director of the organization.

Also at the presentation were players Emily Hunt, Rachel Olson and Christina Burrill.

The women explained that the game is similar to men's professional baseball in terms of rules, that everything transfers from the game men play to the one women play, including the distance between the bases and the distance the pitcher is from home plate. The baseballs are also identical.

The ladies made a positive impression on the girls in the class, too.

Silva Mesrobian, 15, is going to try out for softball.

"I mean, you can learn anything," Mesrobian said. "I wouldn't have [decided to try out] unless I knew."

For more information, visit www.nawbl.com.

Monica Deady can be reached at mdeady@cnc.com.