Abbotsford baseball phenom Raine Padgham has been invited to the All-American Women’s Baseball Classic event, which occurs later this month in Sarasota, Fla.
The event, which runs from Nov. 17 to 19, features 60 of the best women’s baseball players competing at the Baltimore Orioles Ed Smith Stadium in the Sunshine State.
Players are placed onto four different teams (Peaches, Comets, Blue Sox and Belles) and play a short tournament. The championship game is set for Nov. 19. Padgham will be playing on the Belles.
The event is hosted by American Girls Baseball and The All-American Girls Professional Baseball League Players Association. The AAGPBL formed the basis for the hit 1992 film and television show A League of Their Own. It existed from 1943 to 1954 and at its height it featured 10 teams and over 600 women playing. League attendance peaked in 1948 at over 900,000 total spectators.
The team named at the All-American Women’s Baseball Classic are inspired by some of those AAGPBL teams, as the Rockford Peaches, Kenosha Comets, South Bend Blue Sox and Racine Belles will be represented.
Organizers are aiming to create more interest in the women’s game and work towards reaching the game’s popularity in the past. A free clinic for girls 16 and younger conducted by tournament players and coaches will also occur on Nov. 20.
Padgham, who is currently enrolled at Thompson Rivers University and is a member of the Wolfpack baseball team, has been put on loan by TRU baseball head coach Ray Chadwick to participate in the event. She will return to the team for its upcoming trip to Arizona.
Padgham previously played for the Abbotsford Cardinals and Cloverdale Rangers and has also represented Canada at the Women’s Baseball World Cup.
She is one of several Canadian women’s baseball players heading to Florida for the event.
For more information on the event, visit americangirlsbaseball.org.
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