Eri Yoshida play in the Golden Baseball League, the major independent minor league in western North America, by the Chico Outlaws. The Outlaws were managed by former major league all-star Garry Templeton and the team president and general manager was former Los Angeles Dodgers outfielder Mike Marshall. On March 2, 2010, she trained with Tim Wakefield at the Boston Red Sox minor league training facility. On April 8, 2010, she signed the contract with the Chico Outlaws and became the first female professional baseball player in the U.S. since the retirement of Ila Borders 10 years previously, and the first ever to
Knuckleball knuckleballs is known as a knuckleballer. The origins of the knuckleball are unclear. Toad Ramsey of the Louisville Colonels in the old American Association—his pitch likely resembled the knuckle curve—and Eddie Cicotte of the major leagues' Chicago White Sox, who in 1908, was nicknamed "Knuckles", are two possible creators of the pitch. Other accounts attribute the pitch's creation to Charles H. Druery, a pitcher for the Blue Ridge League. In 1917, Druery taught the pitch to Eddie Rommel who became successful with the knuckleball for the Philadelphia Athletics. As used by Cicotte, the knuckleball was originally thrown by holding the