Israel is a win away from earning the last spot at the 2017 World Baseball Classic. Meanwhile Justine Siegal could soon become a coach of this team.

Justine Siegal has a Ph.D. in sport and exercise psychology. She works as a mental skills coach for the Israeli team, which beat Brazil, 1-0, to advance to the championship game of the Brooklyn WBC qualifier. Last year, she became the first woman to ever coach for a Major League team as a guest instructor with the A’s in their instructional league.

“I’m here to help the players, and I love coaching, but I understand the significance,” Siegal noted. “And when I’m standing on that line with those guys, it shows that women can do it, and girls can look up and dream of being there, too.”

She agreed to join Israel’s World Baseball Classic coaching staff last fall. Israel’s manager, Jerry Weinstein, knew of her from her time with the A’s and invited her to coach with the team. He said he would absolutely like to keep Siegal with the team.

“She’s a great resource from the mental-game side, and she also throws BP and she hits fungoes and takes throws – she’s a ballplayer,” Weinstein said. “And I think that just like promoting baseball is a noble thing, what she’s doing is as well”.

Before she started working with the Israeli national team, Siegal had been the first-base coach this season for the independent Frontier League’s Normal CornBelters. It was the latest stop in her professional coaching career, which started in 2009, when Siegal became the first female professional baseball coach with the Broxton Rox. In 2011, she threw batting practice for multiple MLB teams — also the first woman to do so.

“I am hoping to get into affiliated baseball full-time. It’s hard to do the impossible,” Siegal said, “but I think that I’ve proven that I can help a team, and I get along with the guys.”

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