Thank you to NetGalley and Harlequin/Harlequin Heartwarming for access to this egalley to read and give my honest review. The opinions expressed here are my own.
I love me some Karen Rock! This book was fun! She is queen of the slow build romance in my opinion. I liked the "enemies to lovers" kind of vibe you got from this story. Heather and Garret clash but of course there is that underlying attraction that pulls them to one another despite their enemy status. Heather is a strong female lead who is relatable. Garret comes across as your typical sports boy. I did like his connection to the kids in the story. I found that sweet. And their romance is clean, no smut here.
Karen's pacing is great. She threads you along and I was anxious to get to each new chapter to see what would happen. The overall plot was not unique and honestly fairly predictable but still leant a good background to the romance of the story.
I'm not a baseball fan but I liked it enough in this story. I always love a good sports romance. I did find some of the elements of baseball wrong for this story, though. I wish that research had been done.
Overall I flew through this book as it was a truly easy read. And I enjoyed it as it kept me entertained. I will definitely continue to put Rock on my list of authors to read!

If you know absolutely nothing about baseball there's probably a good story in A League of Her Own by Karen Rock - an author I've really enjoyed in the past. Heroine was collegiate softball star and now coaches. Her Daddy owns a minor league, Triple-A baseball team. Daddy has heart attack, heroine convinces him to give her the vacant head coaching job on the team. Hero is a washed up pitcher, now sober, who was signed by Daddy and hopes his second chance jump-starts his baseball career.

The baseball stuff here is wronger than wrong. Triple-A is the top minor league stop before you go to the big leagues. Minor league owners do NOT sign players. General Managers and the front office with the "big clubs" are responsible for filling out rosters (through free agency, the draft, Rule 5 picks etc.) in the entire farm system (Single, Double and Triple A teams). Their job, their desire, is to pick talented players who will eventually become major league baseball players. Your farm system, at all levels, is there to serve the major league club. Hence no minor league owner anywhere would sign a player. A major league owner might have some sway, but not a piddly minor league owner. It's not plausible.

Minor league owners do NOT hire coaches! Again, GMs and the front office at the "big clubs" do that. The major league club has drafted all of these talented players, they're not leaving those players in the hands of a some coach that the minor league owner hired who could be a total wahoo. And while I'm at it? There is more than one coach on any minor league team. Using the Toledo Mud Hens as an example (Detroit's Triple-A team) you have a pitching coach, hitting coach and yes - then your manager (head coach). Hell, when the Tigers hired new pitching coaches for both Triple A and Single A this off-season the announcement came from Dave Dombrowski's office (Tigers GM). And while I'm at it - even though Daddy is looking to sell his Minor League team because they are losing money? He'd have a hard time doing it without input from the major league club, who he would be under contractual obligation to. Major League Baseball teams enter into agreements with these minor league affiliates. Teams can even change affiliation over time (the Syracuse Chiefs, now Washington Nationals Triple A was once the Triple A team for the Toronto Blue Jays, one example) - but again, these are contractual agreements. Like stadium deals. You're going to be "our team" through 2017, for example. Now if the major league club decided to not renew the contract? Then yes, Daddy could sell the team. But he'd also have no players - since the abandoning major league club would move their rosters to whatever city they set up camp in next.

Then the heroine gets the job as manager and starts thinking of ways to increase attendance. Uh, no. NOT YOUR JOB CUPCAKE!! Your job is to manage. To coach. To get the players ready for a possible call-up to the big club. The job of PR? The job of getting butts in the seat? Minor league teams, especially as high up as Triple A (!!!) have front office staffs for that. Minor league promotional departments are legendary in fact. Best family fun a little amount of money can buy in a lot of cities.

So yeah, the baseball stuff is jacked up. But if you know nothing about baseball and don't rightly care? Heroine is desperate for Daddy's approval, the hero is a recovering alcoholic, and if you combine both of the chips they have on their shoulders you've got Texas. I've liked Rock's books in the past but this one was a non-starter for me. Because, you know, baseball.

You can all wake up now. This concludes Inside Baseball Hour at the Bat Cave.