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Atlanta – When Jen Pawol walked into Truist Park’s fields this weekend, she not only did she Create history – She will make money through the most puzzling work in sports for decades.
On Saturday afternoon, Paval will be the first female referee to run a regular season Major League Baseball game and handle Game 1 base Atlanta Warriors– Miami Marlins’ two-headed runner, then moved to the plate to the finale of Sunday’s series.
She sat in her Nashville hotel room Wednesday at the time of the news.
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Archives – Home plate referee Jen Pawol served his first position in a spring training baseball game between the Houston Astros and the Miami Marlins in West Palm Beach, Florida on Sunday, March 10, 2024. (AP Photo/Jeff Roberson, file)
“I’m overwhelmed by emotions,” Paval Tell the Associated Press Thursday. “It was so exciting to finally have that phone call I hoped and worked hard for a while and I felt so full – I felt like a fully charged battery ready to go.”
Her road here is just a quick pass. After years of phone calls NCAA Softball game. She has since been methodical through minors – New York/Pennsylvania League, Midwest League, South Atlantic League, Double-A, and finally Triple-A, in 2023. That season, she became the first in 34 years to win the championship game in Triple-A.
“It’s over 1,200 minor league games, countless hours of video reviews try to get better, and it’s all this passion and love for baseball,” Pavor said. “It started with my game days as a catcher and became a referee, and I think it’s getting stronger when I’m a referee. The referee is for me, it’s in my DNA. It’s been a long and difficult journey.”
Pawol, a three-time Hofstra full-time catcher and 2001 world champion, picked the referee’s mask for the first time, thanks to a friend invited in high school in the early 1990s. In that show, she made $15 per game.
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Archives – Home plate referee Jen Pawol strikes in the third inning in the spring training baseball game between the Miami Marlins and the Houston Astros on Sunday, March 10, 2024. (AP Photo/Jeff Roberson, file)
“It’s a single system,” she recalls. “I didn’t know what I was doing, but I had to put on my gear and call the ball and hit the ball, so I came in.”
She’s been “” ever since – even then – Big League referee Ted Barrett warned her at a 2015 trial camp that it could take a decade for minors to take before she sees the major league stadium.
“I warn her: ‘Look, that’s what you’re facing,” Barrett said. “It’s 10 years in a minor league before you smell a big league field.”
This prediction is almost exactly correct. Pawol’s phone calls make MLB the third in the “Big Four” men’s professional sports leagues, featuring female officials NBA It debuted in 1997, with Sarah Thomas’ NFL debuting in 2015. Thomas continues to work Super Bowl LV between the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and the Kansas City Chiefs. The NHL is now the only reservation.
Jen Pawol follows the footsteps of other female pioneers
Pavor will not be alone this weekend. The 48-year-old said about 30 family members and friends will witness her historic debut at the booth. Many of her minor league referees paved the trail in front of her, including Christine Wren, Pam Postema and Ria Cortesio, who have already expressed their congratulations.
When Postema told her a few years ago “get it!” Pawol promised she would. “I texted her yesterday and said, ‘I’m finishing it!'”
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Archives – Referee Jen Pawol served his first position in a spring training baseball game between the St. Louis Cardinals and the Washington Nationals on Monday, March 4, 2024 at West Palm Beach, Florida. (AP Photo/Jeff Roberson, file)
Outkick will cover Pawol’s first three MLB games on Truist Park’s ground.
In this era, headlines are often compared to symbolic meaning, and Jen Pawol’s journey reminds people that courage is still important.
Pawol is not a symbolic gesture or puffy PR move. She is here because she has surpassed the ride of the bus, the heat of summer and the loneliness of Little League life. Now, for the first time a woman gave it to a big man.
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