A founder of the Greater Utica Sports Hall of Fame in 1990, Gerace has enjoyed a barrier-breaking career as a sports administrator and supporter of local athletic endeavors. She began her baseball career with the Utica Blue Jays, then worked for the Fort Lauderdale Yankees and the Alexandria Dukes before returning to her hometown to join the Utica Blue Sox in 1982.  Over the next seven years, she rose to become a rarity – a female general manager in professional baseball.  In 1983, she convinced noted baseball writer Roger Kahn to buy the Blue Sox, and the independent club went on to win the New York-Penn League championship, a season immortalized in Kahn’s best-selling book, Good Enough to Dream.She worked with New York State Senator Jim Donovan renovate Murnane Field, which was a major factor in keeping professional baseball in Utica. She was the 1987 New York-Penn League Executive of the Year, a two-time New York-Penn League Baseball Woman of the Year, and also was the Business & Professional Women’s Club of Utica’s Business Woman of the Year, among many other honors. She also is the longest-serving member of the Mohawk Valley Auditorium Authority.