Jean Smith

Jean Marie Smith (May 9, 1928 – March 13, 2011) was an outfielder and relief pitcher who played from through in the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League (AAGPBL). Listed at , 128. lb, she batted and threw right-handed.

Smith entered the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League in 1948, beginning her career at outfield and later doubling as a reliever until the final season of play in 1954. Regarded as a disciplined hitter and a daring base runner, she posted a robust .334 on-base percentage and a 1.77 walk-to-strikeout ratio, while utilizing her speed to snatch 194 stolen bases in 567 career games. A member of a championship team, she also played in five out of seven possible playoffs.

Smith was sent to the Fort Wayne Daisies during the 1948 midseason, just in time for playoffs, but Fort Wayne lost the first round to the Rockford Peaches, four games to one. She batted a combined .168 average with 36 runs and 22 runs batted in in 104 games.

In 1949 Smith also was used as a relief pitcher, because Daisies manager Dick Bass thought he had a hard fastball and a good curve. I was a thrower and not a pitcher, she admitted. In that season, she collected a 3.38 earned run average in eight innings of work while playing 25 games at outfield. Fort Wayne advanced again to the playoffs, losing to the Grand Rapids Chicks in the best-of-three first round series.

Bill Allington All-Stars When the league was unable to continue in 1955, Smith joined several other players selected by former Daisies manager Bill Allington to play in the national touring team known as the All-Americans All-Stars. The team played 100 games, each booked in a different town, against male teams, while traveling over 10,000 miles in the manager's station wagon and a Ford Country Sedan. Besides Smith, the Allington All-Stars included players as Joan Berger, Gloria Cordes, Jeanie Descombes, Gertrude Dunn, Betty Foss, Mary Froning, Jean Geissinger, Katie Horstman, Maxine Kline, Dolores Lee, Magdalen Redman, Ruth Richard, Dorothy Schroeder, Dolly Vanderlip and Joanne Weaver, among others.

Life after baseball Following her baseball career, Smith settled down in Harbor Springs, Michigan, where she worked as a secretary at the Harbor Springs IGA and as a bookkeeper for Woodland Buildersand. She also mowed the meadows at Barnyard Golf on her John Deere tractor until retirement in 1992.

Since 1980, Peppas and a group of friends began assembling a list of names and addresses of former AAGPBL players. Her work turned into a newsletter that resulted in the league's first-ever reunion in Chicago, Illinois in 1982. Starting from that reunion, a Players Association was formed five years later and many former AAGPBL players continued to enjoy reunions, which became annual events in 1998. Smith attended the first reunion and regained communication with her teammates and old friends. Of the approximately 560 women who had played in the league, most had lost touch with the others, at least not until the reunion held in Chicago. The association was largely responsible for the opening of an AAGPBL permanent display at the Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum at Cooperstown, New York, opened in , which is dedicated to the entire league rather than any individual personalities. Smith, along with the rest of the league's girls, is now enshrined in the Hall.

Jean Smith died in Harbor Springs, Michigan at the age of 82, following a brief illness.

Career statistics Batting

Pitching GPWLW-L%ERAIPHRAERBBSOWHIP 39 10 10 .500 3.61 172 137 92 69 129 45 1.55 Outfield fielding GPPOAETCDPFA 538 953 78 47 1078 15 .987

Playoff hitting