Last week I wrote about a new ending of the musical “My Fair Lady” in which Liza Dolittle does not stay with Henry Higgins, but demonstrates her independence and leaves to go out in the world on her own.
I ended the blog post by writing:
“It’s clear times have changed since Shaw wrote “Pygmalion” in 1913 when women’s life options were severely limited and controlled by a patriarchal society and in 1956 and 1964 when the play and movie “My Fair Lady” were produced. Liza had few choices.
Today, Liza could be, probably should be, president…of news, of sales, of America.”
As of Wednesday, January 12, add a men’s professional baseball manager to the list of jobs that Liza could have. The NY Times reported:
Rachel Balkovec, a groundbreaking baseball coach, will become the manager of a team in the Yankees’ minor league system, making her the first woman to lead an affiliated professional baseball squad.
Balkovec, 34, will manage the Tampa Tarpons, the low Class A affiliate of the Yankees, for the 2022 season, which begins in April. The Yankees hired her in November 2019 as a hitting coach in their minor leagues. She was believed to be the first woman hired as a full-time hitting instructor by a big-league team.
One thing that Rachel has in common with Liza is that both wanted to improve their language skills. Liza wanted to learn to speak proper upper-class English so she could open up a flower shop, and Rachel learned Spanish so she could communicate more effectively with Spanish-speaking players.
In a January 12, Yankee press conference Balkovec brilliantly answered questions from reporters. One question was about her learning Spanish. She said that she grew up in Nebraska and hadn’t learned Spanish as a child, but that as a hitting coach, she felt she needed to communicate better with some of the players.
Rachel said that it had been great for building relationships because the Spanish-speaking players kidded her about her Spanish and then taught her how to speak better Spanish, while she was able to teach them how to hit better.
She also said that being unable to find a full-time coaching job because she was a woman was a blessing, was good for her because it made her have to be better, more knowledgeable than men and, especially, more determined to succeed. She displayed the meaning of true grit. Angela Duckworth (Grit: The Power and Passion of Perseverance) and Mattie Ross (“True Grit”) would be proud.
All of the reporters who asked questions in the press conference congratulated Balkovec on being named manager of the Tarpons, and several said it was good for baseball and that it was about time.
And it is about time for baseball and for America that we have a woman leader. One reason is because, hopefully, like Rachel Balkovec, the woman who eventually leads America will have to be smarter, better prepared, more persistent, and a better communicator than the men who preceded her.
