Clemson University student Sarah Dennis is hoping to one day become a varsity head baseball coach. She is gaining great experience this season as an assistant coach at EHS. (Jeff Holt | The Easley Progress).
EASLEY — Baseball!
That’s what Clemson University student Sarah Dennis wants to do one day … be the varsity head coach in baseball. She is currently serving as an assistant baseball coach for the Gill Payne-led Easley team.
“I love baseball and I’ve always been around baseball,” Dennis said. “It is one of my favorite things in the world.”
Continued Dennis, right before the game last week against Woodmont, “I grew up watching the best baseball team in the nation — the (Los Angeles) Dodgers, obviously. Also, I grew up with my brother (Jack) playing and my sisters and I playing.”
You can see Dennis in the dugout with the Green Wave baseball team, as well as helping out with pregame and practices.
At first, all of this caught Coach Payne by surprise.
“I teach a couple of courses at Clemson on-line with athletic leadership and my department chair contacted me,” Payne said. “He said I’ve got a girl looking to work with baseball and I thought of you. She came over and met with me. I was kind of confused and I said are we talking about baseball or softball. She said baseball coach. I love baseball. I’m a huge Dodgers fans and I helped my high school team. I played softball, but baseball is the sport I love.”
The dedication of Dennis to this baseball internship has not gone unnoticed, either. She even cut her spring break a bit short and flew back to South Carolina to be there for some recent Green Wave baseball games.
“You talk about commitment,” Payne added. “She sh0uld be home with her family (on her break) and I’m not paying her. She bought into the team and they bought into her.”
Back in 2009, Justine Siegal became the first woman in history to be hired in men’s professional sports, when the independent Brockton Rox brought her in as a first-base coach. Siegel went on to become the first coach at the major-league level in 2015. The Oakland A’s brought Siegal to throw batting practice, and she also became an instructor for Oakland’s instructional league team.
In November 2019, the New York Yankees made MLB history by hiring what’s believed to be the first female hitting coach in Rachel Balkovec.
It should be interesting how all this pans out for Coach Dennis. She is gaining great experience doing little things like helping out with the bunt stations, running the scorebook for the team, running the machine in the outfield at practice and helping with the technology part of it with the camera system.
Reach Jeff Holt at 864-855-0355.