Mexican baseball league to get first female umpire

MEXICO CITY – The Mexican baseball league is on track to get its first female umpire in the 2018 season.

The league said Wednesday that Paulina Rojas and Luz Alicia Gordoa are in training and at least one will of them officiate a game during the regular season.

Gordoa has played softball for 21 years and has served as a softball umpire for five years. Barajas has been an umpire in baseball youth leagues.

Mexico’s Triple-A-equivalent league will get a female umpire before Major League Baseball, which hasn’t had any yet.

One woman, Ria Cortesio, was an umpire in Double-A play in the United States for nine years, until 2007. Before that, Pam Postema umpired in the Triple-A Pacific Coast League for six seasons in the 1980s. Both women also were umpires in MLB exhibition games, but they never worked games in the regular season.