According to the Atlantic League and MLB.com, history was made on Wednesday when the Kentucky Wild Health Genome drafted Alexis Hopkins, the first woman ever drafted by an American professional baseball team for a role. on the field, according to the Atlantic League and MLB.com.
According to an interview with the Northwest Florida Daily News in 2015, a catcher nicknamed her “Scrappy” for her rates of work in the field, according to an interview with the Northwest Florida Daily News in In 2015, Hopkins was selected as the eighth pick in the annual draft of the Atlantic League.
Founded in 1998, the Atlantic League is the highest level of professional baseball league excluding Major League Baseball (MLB) and an official partner league of MLB based in the Southeastern United States. .
More than 40% of the league’s players have MLB experience, and each year, the league averages more than 50 player sales to MLB organizations, according to the league’s website.
Genomes – whom Lindsay Gardner serves as a hitting consultant – said in an Instagram post that more of the women in the club will help the team “further change the face of professional baseball.”
A DREAM BECOME TRUE
“We’re incredibly excited to give Scrappy the opportunity to play football in Lexington and become the first female in the Atlantic League,” Genomes director Mark Minicozzi said, according to the Kentucky-based NBC affiliate LEX 18. .
“We are delighted to see her begin her journey into professional baseball,” Minicozzi added.
When asked to write down his dream during college, Hopkins shied away from seeing professional baseball as a realistic goal.
“I’m really excited about this,” Hopkins said in a video posted on Twitter by the Atlantic League.
“I was going to knock out a professional baseball player, but I really didn’t because I thought, ‘That’s never going to happen,’ but I guess this is where we’re turning today.” a dream come true.”
The Genomes are scheduled to play their first home game of the season against the team they share Wild Health Field with, Lexington Legends, on July 4.
