An Australian baseball prodigy believed to be the fastest female pitcher on the planet is fielding interest from US colleges and quietly dreaming of becoming the first woman to pitch in Major League Baseball.
Genevieve Beacom, 18, a left-hand pitcher with a 138kph [85.9mph] fastball and mean curveball, who last year became the first female to play for a professional team in Australia, has just returned home to Victoria after a three-month stint at Tread Athletics, a private US-based baseball development facility.
At Tread in North Carolina, Beacom worked on her velocity and pitching mechanics, built muscle and studied nutrition, all to get faster, fiercer and land a junior college offer that would see her study and play in the US for two years.
In baseball, the genders are allowed to compete against each other but rarely do, meaning she has played almost exclusively against males since she was nine years old. If she makes it in the US, Beacom would be as much of a trailblazer as she is in her home country. The only other Australian female to have played collegiately in the US is Queenslander Luisa Gauci.
Beacom says playing college ball is the “next logical step” in her convention-busting career.
She was the first girl to represent Australia at the Cal Ripken World Series in the US at just 12, the first to represent Victoria at Under-16 level and the first to pitch in division one baseball in Victoria before she took to the mound for the Melbourne Aces in the Australian Baseball League’s Melbourne Challenge in January 2022.
After her time with Tread coaches, who shared vision of her on social media, the quietly spoken teenager has “had a bunch of coaches reach out already”.
“I’m trying to find the one; a college where I not only like the baseball program but also somewhere I will enjoy living, as it’s quite a big move, obviously,” says Beacom, who graduated from Flinders christian community college in Tyabb, Victoria last year.
Beacom, this week named in the Australian women’s squad for the upcoming World Cup, hopes to get a full scholarship “at a great school” in a good conference and would like to study psychology.
With most US conferences in-season now, it may be a while before she gets an offer she wants and relocates, like her 25-year-old brother Sam who attended Lower Columbia College in Washington and Charleston Southern University in South Carolina.
“Hopefully in the next couple of months, I can find the one but if I don’t this year, that’s OK, I’m not stressed about it,” she says. “I can just do it again next year. I’m still young.”
After college, history awaits. “MLB? Yeah, I think that’s every baseball player’s dream, growing up, definitely, for sure. But at the moment I’m trying to take it step-by-step,” Beacom says, explaining she may apply for a four-college place post-junior college.
The team manager of Australia’s national women’s side the Emeralds, Jason Pospishil, says Beacom’s current speed makes her the best in the world “on information we know”.
“The highest velocity at the last women’s World Cup in 2018 was 78mph [125kph],” he says. “Her current velocity at 85.9mph [138kph] would be comparable to the better pitchers in the male Under-18 World Cup squad.”
She is also as fast as the best men playing professionally in Australia. Pospishil expects the 18-year-old – who he describes as a “great athlete” who could easily turn her hand to other sports – to get quicker.
“I am 100% confident she will continue to build velocity,” he says. “I think 90mph [144kph] is well within her reach if she stays healthy and continues to build strength.” Beacom agrees: “I’ve definitely got more in me, speed-wise.”
And could she break baseball’s glass ceiling and become the first female to pitch in Major League Baseball? “You can never say never, right?” Pospishil says.
“If she starts to touch that 90mph [144kph] threshold and continues to refine her control, there is a realistic possibility that professional teams could take some interest,” he says, acknowledging “the hardest guys in MLB” pitch at 100mph-plus (160kph).
Her ball speed and skills as an offensive player and defensive first baseman aside, Pospishil says Beacom’s best assets are her desire to improve and smash norms.
“Gen has continued to break boundaries in our sport throughout her entire career and [playing college ball] would show the younger generation that it is possible for a female athlete to compete against their male counterparts if they have the necessary skill set,” he says.
“We are starting to see more and more opportunities for female athletes not just in Australia, but around the world and Gen is an example of the huge strides we have made as a society around female athletes.”
The title of role model sits a little uncomfortably on Beacom’s broad shoulders.
“When I look in the mirror, I just see myself, I don’t see somebody to look up to,’ she says. “But I know there are little girls around the world who do and I feel so honoured about that.
“I was flicking through Instagram and I saw a post that was 10 slides of girls playing baseball and the caption was ‘Who is going to be next Genevieve Beacom?’ And I’ve got to say that was the most heartwarming thing I’ve ever seen.”
