Daughters tossed baseballs with their mothers as they warmed up for the finale of Warren Park’s first all-girls baseball league Sunday.
“I want girls to be able to play in the Major Leagues,” declared Weezy Gansner of Edgewater.
The 9-year-old is a spitting image of her mom, Rachel Gansner, 43, who recalled early dreams of being the first woman in the NBA before dedicating herself to softball in middle school and discovering women’s baseball after college.
“For me, it was easier to feel successful in baseball because I could throw and hit the (baseball) so much further and faster (than a softball),” said the mother of two. She founded the all-girls league to ensure Weezy and her peers have an opportunity to thrive in baseball from a young age.
“I’m generally passionate about changing some of the stereotypes we have about girls in all sports. Baseball and softball is a great place to start because it’s the only sport where the counterpart for girls is actually a different sport,” said Gansner, who’s no stranger to the prejudice. She coached her 11-year-old son Georgie’s Little League team into the state tournament this summer despite facing skepticism about her qualifications.
The all-girls league she started this fall at the park in the West Ridge neighborhood is designed to catch girls before they would typically transition from co-ed baseball leagues to softball around age 10. And the interest in the inaugural season was larger than Gansner expected.
Twenty-three girls were divided among four teams: the Blue Sox, Comets, Peaches and Belles. They’ve had weekly practices and played scrimmages every Sunday, where Georgie was an enthusiastic and diligent announcer.
“I want to get these young girls before they believe that there is no space for them to stay in baseball, to show them that they belong,” said Gansner, recalling how a girl asked her if she could practice pitching at the beginning of the season. The player said the coach of her co-ed team had only allowed boys to pitch during games.
It reaffirmed Gansner’s motivation to give girls a focused space to ask questions and build skills. She hopes they’ll have more confidence when they return to their co-ed teams.
“I want to learn more and more. I just want to get better,” said Blue Sox player Maya SinhaRoy-Wright of West Rogers Park. The 8-year-old had been watching her older brother play baseball, so it just made sense to her that she’d play the same sport.
The new league is too small for a traditional tournament, so Sunday’s final event was a series of drills showcasing the batting, hitting and catching skills the 23 baseball players have been learning.
Regardless of their jersey colors, girls cheered each other on. Ultimately, they’re all on the same small but mighty team establishing a place for girls in baseball.
“You girls accomplished something that has never been done in this city before,” Gansner said before each girl received a pin to commemorate them as trailblazers.
This is just the beginning, Gansner told the Tribune. She has visions for a larger all-girls league at Warren Park with more teams and divisions for girls of all ages.
