Former girl's baseball league player to throw out first pitch at Mariners game



Dorothy Roth tore up all her pictures.
“I was kind of ashamed of it.”

After all, in 1945, playing baseball wasn’t the social norm. But when a scout approached her with a chance to play in the national girls baseball league, she needed the money.

“I earned (shrugs) 29 dollars I think, a month.”

So for one season, Dorothy played first base and left field for the Parichy Bloomer Girls, in Illinois, and tried not to make any errors.

“The crowds were mostly old men and uh (coughs) if you made a mistake, they’d throw a beer bottle at ya.”

Now 85 years old, Dorothy’s preparing for the biggest stage of all, throwing out the first pitch before a Mariners game at Safeco Field, hoping the beer bottles remain in the crowd.

“I don’t have the muscle that I used to have...I haven’t been practicing either.”

Not that the crowd will mind. As one of the remaining survivors from a group of players made famous in the movie “A League of Their Own,” Dorothy now continues a legacy she once concealed because of shame.

“I think it opened the door more for women to participate in more sports.”

That door now opened, Dorothy can take the field one last time with her head held high.