In an otherwise good article about Ruffian (September), Gene Smith really missed the boat with this statement: “It has nothing to do with male chauvinism to point out that male horses are stronger, even as male baseball players are stronger, as evidenced by no woman’s ever having played for the New York Mets or Los Angeles Dodgers or any major-league team in any city between the two.”

To argue that the absence of women in baseball is proof that they are unable to compete is ridiculous. I would suggest that the lack of women in baseball is, at the moment, evidence of their lack of welcome at all levels; it is only in the last decade or two that girls have been allowed to play in Little League. Girls/women are not welcome on the hardball diamond. Until they are, at all levels, we will not know if they can compete with men in the “bigs.” I suspect that this is one sport in which some women can do quite well, since, for the most part, it does not require brute strength pitted directly against brute strength.