Janet Marie Smith selected as 2026 SABR Dorothy Seymour Mills Lifetime Achievement Award winner
Acclaimed ballpark designer Janet Marie Smith was honored on Saturday, October 10, 2026, with the Dorothy Seymour Mills Lifetime Achievement Award during the SABR/IWBC Women in Baseball Conference.
SABR’s Women in Baseball Committee established the Dorothy Seymour Mills Lifetime Achievement Award — “The Dorothy” — named in honor of Dorothy Seymour Mills and her lifetime of contributions to promoting women’s baseball.
Smith is the Senior Vice President of Planning and Development for the Los Angeles Dodgers, where since 2012 she has overseen modernization projects at Dodger Stadium, including a new entrance plaza in center field. She is well known in baseball for her work on Oriole Park at Camden Yards, which set the standard for a new wave of ballparks after its opening in 1992 and her oversight of renovations at Fenway Park for the Boston Red Sox from 2002 to 2009. She worked on the transformation of Ed Smith Stadium for the Baltimore Orioles spring training home in Sarasota in 2011 and for the Atlanta Braves’ conversion of the 1996 Olympic Stadium to Turner Field.
She is trained as an architect and urban planner and served as the Edward P. Bass Fellow at the Yale University School of Architecture. Her work outside of sports has included projects such as Battery Park City in New York and the revitalization of Baltimore’s waterfront.
In addition to Smith, the other finalists for the 2026 award were Sarah Langs of Major League Baseball; former All-American Girls Professional Baseball League pitcher Jeneane “Lefty” Lesko; professional umpire Lisa Turbitt; and Maud Nelson, an early 20th-century star pitcher and promoter.
Click here for a list of previous award recipients.
Photo courtesy of the Los Angeles Dodgers.
Originally published: October 10, 2026. Last Updated: October 10, 2026.