‘There just weren’t women playing’ – Kelsie Whitmore, baseball trailblazer
Kelsie Whitmore is one of three figures on the baseball diamond at the Staten Island Community Park. The stands of the ballpark are empty, give or take a few hotdog sellers opening their kiosks in the concourses. Her coach, Nelson Figueroa, is hitting balls at her, which she waits on before reading the angle it will arrive, motioning towards the ball, then receiving it in her mitt with her left hand and throwing back with her right.