Q&A with New York Yankees MiLB Hitting Coach Rachel Balkovec
By Makayla Muscat
In November 2019 Rachel Balkovec made history, becoming the first full-time female hitting coach in the history of professional baseball. This Summer, the MiLB coach is in Australia for a new venture with the Sydney Blue Sox. Read on to find out about Balkovec’s journey, the obstacles she faced, her greatest influences and biggest accomplishments.
Rachel Balkovec headshot. Picture: rachelbalkovec.com
Q: I saw you’ve already visited Sydney Tower and Bankwest Stadium, how are you enjoying Sydney so far?
A: It’s great; Sydney is one of my favourite cities in the world. I’ve travelled a bit, but it’s just the most beautiful, clean, safe city I’ve probably ever been to. So far, my experience has been over the top, phenomenal, and the weather here right now is great.
Q: Why did you choose to pursue a career in professional baseball?
A: I would have to say it started with my time in sports as an athlete myself with softball. I’ve wanted to work in sports since I was young, and I always knew my career would be in sports. Professional baseball came a little bit later, as some of the baseball players from my college were getting drafted to play and I really started to learn about the depths of the Minor League system and how in depth it is. I started learning about how hard the journey is in professional baseball and became fascinated with the development side of things. That’s baseball specifically, but sports has always been on my radar, even softball and coaching I had thought about for a long time.
Q: How did you become a hitting coach with the New York Yankees?
A: Long story short, my first ten years in sports were spent as a strength and conditioning coach, doing more in the weight room, and that was a passion of mine as a person. At some point I realised that I wanted to have more of an impact on the culture of the organisation. I want to be a good general manager and the idea behind being a hitting coach is to get closer to on field evaluation and being able to evaluate players from a specific skill standpoint, not just on their raw physical capabilities like you do as a strength coach. It’s just getting a step closer to evaluating on field talent.
In November 2019, Balkovec made history, becoming the first full-time female hitting coach in professional baseball. Picture: rachelbalkovec.com
Q: What challenges did you have to overcome in getting where you are today?
A: In general, my gender has been the biggest challenge. I don’t say the word lucky a lot, but I’m lucky to be alive at this time where feminism is roaring, and women are in this revolt worldwide. I’ve seen the world change in the last ten years since I’ve been in sports. When I first got in, there were two women in professional baseball working with players. I was the first female strength coach to be hired full time in professional baseball. The celebration surrounding women in society has uplifted everything and I don’t think sports is separate to that; sports is just another business that is reaping the benefits of the feminist movement in the past five to ten years and I think that the challenges that I faced early in my career are happening a lot less.
Q: How did you become involved with the Sydney Blue Sox?
A: Covid-19 hit and our season in the States was cancelled. The Yankees were doing a bunch of zoom calls and like I always do, I joined in on as many calls as I could, even if it wasn’t for the hitting department. I got on a catching call and Jason Phillips, who is a catching coach with the Yankees was talking about how his best friend is a manager at the Blue Sox in Sydney. He was actually seeing if he wanted any of our catchers to go and I thought could a coach go? I just crossed over from being a strength coach to a hitting coach and I really want experience as a hitting coach. I called Jason and he connected me with Shane Barclay, the manager at the Blue Sox. I think we really liked each other from the first time we talked, so I pushed and got an opportunity to coach here which I was super grateful for, especially with everything going on in the States with Covid.
Q: What are three things that your experience in coaching have taught you?
A: I would say the biggest things are compassion and empathy, especially the older I get looking at the players. This is a phenomenal vehicle for them to learn how to be young men, good people, and to use their knowledge and experiences to empower other people. It’s taught me purpose, definitely with my experiences being a female in the field and being able to impact other women. Its taught me that life has a purpose, and you have a responsibility to use your gifts and experiences to impact other people positively.
Q: What is your philosophy on coaching?
A: I don’t have one coaching philosophy; my philosophy is to be able to go to the person I’m talking to, and sometimes that means literally. In professional baseball, we’re working with 50% Latin American players; they all speak Spanish. When I got into baseball I learnt Spanish, I knew how important it was to my career to be able to go to those players, communicate with them, and show them that I was making the effort to learn their culture and language. Sometimes it’s the literal way of learning another language, but also sometimes it’s non-literal way of learning their emotional language or what they’ve been through. I would say being able to adapt to different scenarios is my overall coaching philosophy.
Q: Do you speak any other languages?
A: No, just Spanish and English.
Balkovec says being a hitting coach is a step towards evaluating on field talent. Picture: rachelbalkovec.com
Q: Kim Ng recently became the first female GM at the Miami Marlins; do you aspire to follow in her footsteps?
A: Absolutely. She’s been in the game for thirty years and is more than qualified for the job, but the Marlins and more specifically Derek Jeter gave her an opportunity. She’s earned that and the fact that one of the most famous baseball players of all time hired her says a lot about who she is as a person and how qualified she is. I’ve said for years before she was hired that I want to be a general manager, that’s my goal, and her being hired as a general manager makes my path easier as I go.
Q: Who (coaches or other people) have been great influences in your life?
There are so many. In baseball, Brent Strom (former MLB pitcher, and current Huston Astros pitching coach); he’s an absolute legend in the States and has probably been in the game for fifty years now. He has been an incredible mentor of mine, and you could assume he’s old school and isn’t accepting of women, but he is just the most supportive person. He taught me everything I know about pitching, gave me such an opportunity and protected me when other people weren’t as accepting back in the day. What I love about him is he’s still learning; he’s still trying to gain knowledge and understand the game better and that’s had a huge influence on me.
My current boss Dillon Lawson, he’s a Yankees hitting coordinator. He’s directly responsible for me being hired as a female hitting coach. He’s the one who encouraged me to do eye-tracking for research, which is very, very unique, and he’s given me a different perspective on things. I think thinking outside the box and being willing to adapt are things I’ve taken from both and the people who have impacted me the most are those who continue to grow, no matter how much experience they have.
Q: What is your role in the off-season?
A: During Covid-19 it’s been limited, basically zoom calls, in the off-season that’s usually how it goes anyway, but during Covid it’s been times ten, because we’re not allowed to see the players in any capacity. My role usually is exchanging information digitally and through video. Baseball in the States if full on, it’s a game every single day. We work basically nine months with maybe one day off per month; so, in the off-season it gets very quiet. It’s very relaxed because we work extremely long hours.
Q: What has been your biggest accomplishment?
A: In general, I feel so blessed to have the opportunity to empower other people through my work and do what I love. I think my biggest accomplishment is empowering others, not getting them to hit a baseball better but to live a better life, to make better decisions, and to understand that they have possibilities. I was the first full-time female strength and conditioning coach in the history of professional baseball, I was the first full-time female hitting coach in the history of professional baseball, those are the literal outcomes, but the opportunity to empower other people, probably specifically women is the greatest accomplishment.
Q: What advice would you give to women aspiring to succeed in male dominated professions?
A: The most common piece of advice I give is, if something’s not fair and it’s too hard don’t complain about it; that’s an advantage. I was discriminated against and that was an advantage to me; I say now that I’m glad I had a hard time because it made me work harder. Now my resume is incredible because I had to do all this extra work, and that extra work made me better, period. I appreciate that I started from a disadvantage because of my gender and I know that there are now a lot of minority opportunities, but I wouldn’t apply for those. I didn’t have those opportunities or internships and I’m so glad I didn’t, because it made me really have to earn it, and it took a lot longer, but it made me better in the end.
Q: What is one word or phrase that you hope players use to describe you?
A: Passionate.