The Red Sox made history earlier this winter and at first, didn’t even know they had.
By hiring Katie Krall as a development coach at Double-A Portland, the Sox became the first-ever major-league franchise to employ two female coaches (the other is minor league coach Bianca Smith, who was hired in Dec. 2020). Another glass ceiling had been shattered, but no one in the organization knew it until The Boston Globe’s Alex Speier tweeted about the feat on Jan. 13.
It’s something that Krall and Sox director of player development Brian Abraham laughed about earlier this week -- and another sign that baseball continues to take steps forward when it comes to gender diversity. Just two weeks ago, the Yankees made history by hiring Rachel Balkovec as the manager of their low-A affiliate in Tampa and making her the first female manager in the ever in affiliated baseball.
“I definitely think that at a point we will get to a place where women will just be hired,” Krall said Wednesday from the Sox’ complex in Fort Myers, where she’s coaching minor-leaguers attending the club’s Winter Warm Up program. “It won’t necessarily result in a Zoom call with reporters. I think that would be phenomenal. That’s the ultimate goal, that it doesn’t become newsworthy anymore.”
Krall, a 2018 Northwestern graduate, has worn a few different hats in her short, yet impressive, career. While in school, she was a student promotions coordinator for the Wildcats’ baseball program, then later a World Series trophy tour coordinator for the Cubs. She served as an assistant general manager of the Hyannis Harbor Hawks in the Cape Cod Baseball League, then spent nearly two years working for Major League Baseball as a coordinator of league economics and operations after graduation. From Jan. 2020 to Oct. 2021, she worked for the Reds as a baseball operations analyst; she had a quick, two-month stint in Google’s global strategy department before joining the Sox. Krall’s academic career isn’t over either, as she is currently pursuing her MBA from the University of Chicago and expects to graduate in the spring.
Krall, who has always had her eye on a front office career, never thought she’d end up in uniform at any level. But when Red Sox manager of baseball development Chris Stasio reached out in early November to discuss the concept of a development coach -- a uniformed liaison who shares information and analytical data between players and the front office -- she was more than intrigued.
“It appealed to me for a number of reasons,” Krall said. “I think, being with a franchise like Boston that has put such an emphasis on building that sustainable pipeline of talent, it seemed like the confluence of a lot of different factors that I felt my background in front offices would lend very well to.”
Krall, like other women in the game, has met her fair share of detractors throughout her career. To combat their misogyny, she takes comfort in a 2019 Sports Illustrated quote from Mets slugger Pete Alonso. Instead of proving her doubters wrong, Krall said, echoing Alonso, she’s trying to prove her believers right.
“There definitely have been people who are not receptive to having women in baseball... to the point of the cultural paradigm shifting, it definitely has, but that does not mean there is not still misogyny, there isn’t still sexism,” she said. “When you do meet those people who discard you simply because of your gender or for those who have encountered racism in the game, I think it can be difficult but you just have to stay true to yourself. Find those mentors and find those champions.”
Smith and Krall haven’t met yet, but they’re sure to be champions for each other as they navigate their unique journeys in the Red Sox’ organization. At Fenway South, there are already signs that significant cultural changes are afoot.
“(Smith’s) gear is in the women’s locker room, so she’s there in spirit,” Krall said.
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