Balkovec becomes 1st woman to manage MLB farm team

Rachel Balkovec became the first woman hired to manage a minor league affiliate of a Major League Baseball team.

The 34-year-old joined the Yankees organization in 2019, making her the first woman with that job full-time in affiliated baseball. She got her first position in pro ball with the St. Louis Cardinals as minor league strength and conditioning coach in 2012. Balkovec, a former softball catcher at Creighton and New Mexico, moved from the Cardinals to the Houston Astros in 2016. She briefly left baseball in 2018 to pursue a second master’s degree at Vrije University in the Netherlands, where she also worked with the country’s national baseball and softball teams.