Teenaged Female Shortstop Could Be Signed by MLB Team

Transcript

DAVID GREENE, HOST:

A 16-year-old baseball prospect. Here's the scouting report - very smooth and fluid in the field. She swings the bat really well and is fearless. Yes, I said she. She is a baseball player named Melissa Mayeux.

LINDSAY BERRA: She is a 16-year-old girl who the scouts say is as good as any 16-year-old boy at her position, which is shortstop.

GREENE: That is Lindsay Berra. She's a columnist at mlb.com. Mayeux plays on France's Under-18 Junior National Baseball Team. And recently, she made history as the first female player on Major League Baseball's list of international players eligible to join a team.

BERRA: I think her presence on this list is going to have scouts and college coaches and everybody watching to see how she develops. And I think that we'll see her play somewhere for sure.

GREENE: Now, international prospects usually do not sign with big league clubs at 16, whether they're boys or girls. That normally comes a couple years later. Needless to say, a woman making it to the big leagues would be a huge deal.

BERRA: Oh, my God, incredibly significant if she were to make the majors, but I think that's getting way ahead of ourselves at this point (laughter).

GREENE: Instead, it's more likely that we'll see Mayeux somewhere else.

BERRA: She's still eligible to play in the American collegiate system. She's eligible to play for France in the World Baseball Classic in 2017.

GREENE: Of course, France is not much of a baseball hotspot. In fact, it has never qualified for the World Baseball Classic. So while American baseball writers are buzzing about Mayeux, one of her coaches says she's just playing it low-key.

BERRA: He said that it was going to be news to her that this was newsworthy in the United States. She just sort of views it as the next step in her baseball career.

GREENE: That's mlb.com's Lindsay Berra speaking about French baseball prospect Melissa Mayeux. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.