Daughter of longtime talent evaluator making name for herself

Amanda Hopkins smiles at the memory of those afternoons when she was 5 years old, sitting in a ballpark with her father, who was scouting a high school baseball game.

"I would go to games with my dad, traveling in the summer to see players in the Cape Cod League, Alaskan League, the East Coast Showcase," she said. "People would see me and would ask, 'What do you want to do when you grow up?' I'd tell them I want to be a baseball scout, and they'd be like, 'Oh, that's cute.' I'm sure they thought I'd grow out of it."

Nineteen years later, and the dream has come true. Hopkins is back on the road, starting her third year as a scout for the Seattle Mariners, keeping track on players from the Four…