ALYSSA NAKKEN LATEST IN WOMEN’S COACHING HIRES
Shockwaves rippled across the country last week when the San Francisco Giants hired Alyssa Nakken, a Woodland native, as an assistant coach.
With the hire by the Giants new manager Gabe Kapler, Nakken made history as the first woman to become a full-time coach in Major League Baseball.
“In every organization, environment affects performance, and baseball clubhouses are no different,” Giants manager Gabe Kapler said via NBC SPORTS Bay Area. “That’s why in addition to assisting the rest of the coaching staff on the field, Mark and Alyssa will focus on fostering a clubhouse culture that promotes high performance through, among other attributes, a deep sense of collaboration and team.”
“The Giants organization just got better,” said Alyssa’s mom Gaye Nakken. “Not just because she is a woman, its because of who she is and what she’ll bring to the table. This isn’t just her mom talking, its how Alyssa has run her life through school and activities.”
According to her mother, Alyssa’s sporting journey started off like so many others have with Tee-ball at the age of 6 before joining a travel ball team from age nine right up until she graduated from Woodland High School.
Her travel ball coach Gabe Abelia had been coaching Nakken since she was 10.
“She was a dream to coach,” Abelia said of Alyssa, who is now 29. “I knew something big would happen for her in her career. She is just that type of person. Her work ethic was undeniable. You would not believe how hard she worked.”
As a standout three-sport athlete at Woodland High School, where she played volleyball, basketball, and softball, Alyssa graduated in 2008 and earned a full academic scholarship to play softball at Sacramento State.
“Alyssa is a great person all the way around,” former Woodland High School softball coach Mieko Mendenhall said. “She is really a student of the game and really soaks in the things that you are saying and tries to understand the reasonings behind why you’re doing certain things. There was never any question as to if she was putting in the work.”
Alyssa continued her ascension into a star for the Hornets, becoming a fourtime All-Pacific Coast Softball Conference selection during her four years there from 2009-12, including a first-team all-league choice in 2012, second team in 2011 and 2010, along with with an honorable mention her first season.
She started all 184 games in which she appeared with the Hornets, primarily playing first base, which included a run of 164 consecutive starts.
“She was just so extraordinary,” said former Sacramento State softball coach Kathy Strahan, who coached Alyssa all four years. “I’ve dealt with a lot of student-athletes throughout the years, and you have those that you just know are extraordinary, and she was one of those. I really thought she was going to do something special. She was so driven, smart, a great teammate, and very coachable. Just an outstanding young lady.”
Alyssa brought an outstanding work ethic with her everywhere she went gaining similar praises from each of her coaches along her journey.
“She was our version of ‘Pigpen,’ the ‘Charlie Brown’ character who is always walking around dirty,” Strahan said with a laugh. “We are all talking ground balls warming up an hour and a half before game time, and she is already on sidelines diving for ground balls before we even took the field, covered in dirt. As a coach, you love that. You’d rather try to put the reigns on an athlete than asking more out of them.”
“She was always dirty,” Abelia said. “I’d have to tell her to slow down. She was very fundamentally sound and watching her, you could see that she worked on her fundamentals.”
After graduating from Sacramento State in the spring of 2012 with a 3.76-grade point average, Alyssa took a year off before attending the University of San Francisco to pursue a master’s degree in sports management.
During her time there, Alyssa applied for and got an internship with the Giants in the baseball operations department in 2014. She was selected from a pool of over 100 applicants, charting the course for her baseball career.
“I got several texts from moms who have young girls that have said their girls are jumping up and down, and they don’t even know Alyssa,” Gaye Nakken said. “I think a lot of women are just happy to see that barrier open up to women showing that they can get into a predominantly male industry. That can only help everyone. Women can bring a different perspective to things, so why would that ever be a bad thing?”
Progress for women coaches in the traditionally male-dominated sports world has been slow, but there has been some improvement over the years. In 2014, Becky Hammon became the first full-time woman assistant coach in NBA history. There are currently 10 other women assistants in the NBA.
In the NFL, Katie Sowers will also make history by becoming the first female assistant to coach in the Super Bowl.
“I know she will probably open doors for women for all different sports,” Abelia said, referring to Alyssa. “She is definitely an advocate for women’s sports. I knew she was destined to have something like this happen to her. She is fearless. She doesn’t take no for an answer, and she will not stop until she gets to the top.”
Strahan shares that sentiment.
“It’s amazing to see her be the first to shatter the ceiling in a traditional men’s sport,” Strahan said. “I’m just so excited for her. It will be really interesting to see where this leads next because for Alyssa I think there will be a next job.”
“I know it’s going to be hard for her, and there are going to be people that don’t understand it, but she has got everything that she needs to prove to them that she is the right choice for this,” Gaye Nakken said. “She will be challenged, but she has all the tools shes worked very hard for this sort of position, so I have all the confidence in the world that she can do this.”