Because it was launched 5 years in the past, the Jennie Finch Empowerment Award has acknowledged oft-overlooked women softball gamers, giving the subsequent era the sources to construct a vibrant future within the recreation and past.
A legendary softball pitcher, Finch has lengthy been an inspiration on the sector following a storied profession that featured a 2001 Girls’s School World Sequence title with the College of Arizona, two Olympic medals in ’04 and ’08 and enshrinement within the Nationwide Softball Corridor of Fame.
Now, her position as MLB’s youth softball ambassador has allowed Finch to take a hands-on method to rising the sport off the sector, notably by means of her namesake award that she referred to as a “dream” to offer out every year.
“The Empowerment Award is such a thrill,” Finch mentioned. “These younger women are distinctive, and simply to offer them an award, to honor them, to shine a light-weight on them and spend money on their future. … I can not wait to see what they do and the way they do it at that subsequent degree.”
Management, motivation, dedication, dedication, humility and integrity are the six guiding ideas of the award, which is given yearly to 4 younger feminine softball gamers who’re exemplary students, humanitarians and athletes. Every winner receives a $10,000 scholarship to go towards their faculty schooling courtesy of Arm & Hammer, which has contributed a complete of $180,000 to the initiative since its inception in 2019.
One key characteristic of the award is that it places feminine athletes on the forefront, a deserving distinction for softball gamers who usually are not usually acknowledged on the identical degree as their counterparts on the baseball diamond.
“It simply all the time feels actually good to know that individuals are actually searching and actually help and need to have the ability to amplify not simply our expertise on the sector but additionally the onerous work we put behind [the field],” MLB Community persona and Gold Glove Award winner A.J. Andrews mentioned on the roundtable.
Every year, a winner is known as on the major MLB Develops softball occasions: the Breakthrough Sequence, the Elite Improvement Invitational, the Jennie Finch Traditional throughout All-Star week and the RBI World Sequence. The 2023 honorees have been Karley Clark from Fairfield, Ohio; Jada Cooper from Houston, Texas; Kristin White from Gambrills, Md.; and Ana Gonzalez from Midlothian, Texas.
The entire winners have been honored on the sector earlier than Recreation 2 of the 2023 World Sequence at Globe Life Area.
“It is simply going to assist me and my household out so much,” Gonzalez mentioned. “I am so excited to carry this again to my household as a result of they’ve poured a lot into me, and now I get to offer a bit again.”
Whereas the award may be life-changing for the winners, it will possibly additionally give them the capabilities to at some point pay it ahead to others.
“My mother’s a single mother of three, so after we moved to Houston, we have been struggling a bit bit to get on our ft and stuff. Then we discovered this actually, actually good program referred to as RaiseUp Households,” Cooper mentioned. “They helped us get again on our ft, and I used to be like, ‘I wish to assist out different folks get again on their ft.’ It feels actually good to offer again as a result of I used to be as soon as of their sneakers.”
The Empowerment Award additionally creates a group amongst gifted younger softball gamers constructed round shared experiences, giving them a community and help system they’ll carry into their futures.
“The camaraderie is nice,” Clark mentioned. “It is like a large household expertise. It is like everybody’s not related, however all of us have related pursuits.”
That bond goes past the sport.
“I like being part of a sisterhood, particularly a sisterhood filled with different elite softball gamers,” White mentioned. “I am going to all the time have a group the place I can fall again on or push one another … and it is simply very nice to know I’ve that sisterhood.”