Fans of minor league baseball and prospects got a shot across the bow on Friday as the New York Times released an article with details about an upcoming proposal to Major League Baseball that could drastically impact the world of minor league baseball and beyond. Baseball America followed up with a piece that went into significantly more detail, along with an interesting podcast as well. Through all of this, debates began to rage on social media - is this good for the game in the end? Who benefits? Who is hurt? How will this change the game beyond the majors and minors?
We’re going to attempt to address some of that here.
The First Shot
Those who were paying attention have known something along the lines of this proposal was coming, and Fivethirtyeight’s Travis Sawchik became the first to sound the major alarm in early September. His piece was poorly titled, “Do we even need minor league baseball?” The article, however, didn’t exactly match the title, with the piece really focusing on whether we needed AS MUCH minor league baseball as is currently being utilized.
Featuring the Houston Astros and their approach of reducing teams between full-season leagues and complex teams, Sawchik discussed short-season leagues as a part of the game that could end up quickly being phased out by many smart teams that were looking to maximize the effectiveness of their investment in development. Teams have invested in their minor league teams by purchasing their full-season affiliates over the last few seasons, and that’s changed how teams can direct the focus of the facilities they use, as the Astros were referenced for implementing hosts of analytical cameras and other tools into each of their facilities to assist in player development.
That ownership piece has really shifted the game from a community that owned and leased the team and facility to a major league team, seeing those affiliates shuffle every few years as affiliate contracts would expire. Now, with teams owning most of their affiliates, that “affiliate shuffle” is nearly nil as no one is really looking for a new potential match. Communities would entice major league teams by improving facilities, improving the areas around the park, and even building brand new ballparks. However, one noted thing with owned affiliates was a lack of incentive to improve facilities.
That left the minor leagues, as Sawchik mentioned in his piece, “ripe for change.”
The Proposal - Technology, Dreams, Money, and Nightmares
The New York Times was the first on Friday to come out with information about the proposal that is reported to be presented to owners at owner meetings this offseason. Baseball America’s J.J. Cooper came out with a much deeper dive into the proposal as he was working on the same piece in more depth when NYT published.
Here are the full details in quick bullets, to be explored in full the rest of this piece:
Would be implemented beginning in 2021
Reducing to 120 minor league teams (essentially losing ~40 teams)
Establish new facility standards
Geographic association with MLB club
Shared cost between MLB and MiLB in increased player pay
Standard valuations of minor league teams by class
Creation of “Dream League”
Limits of 5 USA minors clubs and 150-200 contract players per MLB team
Shifting draft later
Reduction in the agreement terms to 5 years from 7 years previously
That’s a whole host of things. Needless to say, Minor League Baseball is not a huge fan of this proposal, as The Athletic’s Evan Drellich wrote. Let’s break down some of the implications:
Impact on minor league towns/teams
One of the major things that Minor League Baseball president Pat O’Conner discussed in the Drellich piece is how MLB did not give the teams and/or towns that are not up to the standards MLB would like them to be a chance to meet new standards. In fact, they did not set new standards at all. The standards for the fields set in the 1990 agreement between MLB and MiLB have not been changed, so while there may certainly be accurate frustration with conditions in some cities, every facility is currently meeting the current standards.
That means that over 40 (estimations are 42-45, depending on other cities that could be added to meet the 120 club mark) communities will lose their minor league team, an employer in the community, a source of pride for many communities, and will have an empty ballpark that MLB has deemed not up to standard, which is likely going to mean they would not be able to attract a team in the newly-formed Dream League.
The very significant issue here that MLB certainly should know, but continues to make proposals like this that undermine, is that losing minor league baseball in a community due to this proposal could certainly inspire negative feelings toward the game in general in areas that have been positive for the game. One major issue that has been mentioned is attendance in the minor leagues being a reason for the proposed changes. The issue is that attendance was actually up in the minor leagues in 2019. MLB could be cutting off its nose to spite its face with fans with this move.
Impact on minor league players
Over the last few years, many have written about the horrific state of minor league pay. Tyler Cyr of the San Francisco Giants shared his final paystub of the year on Twitter, showing take-home pay of less than $9,000 for the entire year. Reporting when pitchers and catchers report on February 12 and going home the day after the Triple-A championship, which would have been September 18, that would be just a hair over 31 weeks, making his pay less than $300 per week.
Within the reports on the MLB proposal were mentions of increased pay to minor league players. While it’s not stated directly, this would primarily be feasible due to the elimination of roughly 1,300 players from the minor leagues, which would allow teams to pay more. For instance, the New York Yankees currently operate with between 275 and 300 minor league players under contract in a season. If they are forced to reduce to 150-200 along with having fewer rounds of the draft to pay bonus money to, the team could double pay and likely end up coming out ahead overall.
The other issue for players is that this sort of view on the minor leagues turns all work with minor leagues to be a mark of efficiency and measurables. In BA’s piece, Mitch Haniger is quoted as saying essentially that there is nothing to aid development like playing games. Many players who don’t fit an ideal height, weight, exit velocity, fastball velocity, spin rate, or other measurable has shown to be successful through work in-game.
Players who often would be the guys drafted in the 25th-40th rounds of the draft from small colleges will likely now end up in the Dream League, which means no signing bonus for those players to begin their professional career, and there are no assurances that Dream League salaries won’t end up being similar to current minor league pay, leaving those players without an organization giving them specific direction, hoping for a chance to catch on with an organization.
Impact on the draft
It’s been mentioned in this piece already, but with reduced minor league rosters, the draft would be reduced as well. That’s only part of the impact on the draft, but it would be significant. In less than 20 years, the draft will have gone from unlimited rounds to 25-30 rounds (reporting has not been consistent on whether the draft would be reduced to 25 or 30 rounds). Previously, the draft was held until teams stopped choosing players, going as many as 100 rounds in 1996 before reducing to the current 40 round format in 2012.
While they’re long shots to make the major leagues, any draft pick in baseball is truly a long shot to be a major leaguer. The elite players can come from any round of the draft for sure. In fact, the rounds that are being considered for elimination are where players like Mark Buehrle, Kenny Rogers, and Kevin Kiermaier were drafted. Before the 40-round format, players like Keith Hernandez, Mike Piazza, Jeff Conine, and Orlando Hudson were selected and had impressive careers selected after the 40th round.
The major change in the draft will really be in the timing of the draft. Changing the draft timing to after the College World Series is something that makes a lot of sense. It is an oddity to many to watch top college players in the dugout of a playoff game on their way to Omaha getting the information that they’d been selected in the draft. This should be an impactful moment, something the player can celebrate with family and friends. Moving the draft later certainly does allow for that along with also allowing for more player attendance at the draft itself.
However, moving the draft later (to the first Monday in July, for instance) means that teams are busy negotiating contracts with newly drafted players while also working deadline deals for their major league clubs. The biggest impact would be in less time in a player’s draft season to play, assuming a couple of weeks from the draft date to the signing deadline. That would essentially only leave August for draftees to play complex ball, a significant difference.
Impact on independent baseball
Beyond the stated goal of recruiting independent clubs from ideal markets into the minor leagues in the proposal (something those cities could and should be quite upset about, and if it’s directly mentioned in any proposal could bring potential legal action), the effect on independent baseball could be significant - in both directions.
In a positive direction, more attention would be paid to independent leagues in communities where a minor league team was removed and there would be communities open to new clubs after losing their minor league club if they cannot support a Dream League club. There could be higher-quality players available to independent clubs that are on the “higher” end of facilities and development of players with some of those guys who’d normally be selected in the 25th-40th rounds choosing to play independent ball rather than be part of a Dream League team.
The major negative is that from every indication, MLB would expect to recruit top-shelf independent facilities to join the minor leagues. That could remove those top independent clubs from independent baseball. Scouting would also be much more prevalent in independent ball, which could be excellent for the attention, but it could mean that the top talent doesn’t stick around like it once did.
Impact on college baseball
Moving the draft, as mentioned earlier, would be positive to the focus on college baseball’s playoff tournament, including the finals of the College World Series in Omaha each year, one of the best baseball experiences that any fan can attend. Players could focus their energy on their team’s pursuit. The later date of the draft would also mean that players would get their playing time from the collegiate season, which would allow coaches to utilize their players as needed, though hopefully managing pitcher arms in a responsible way would still be something emphasized.
One major thing the college game could see is an influx of talent with the shift in the number of players under contract for each organization. Teams will likely want to focus their development time and energy on players who will follow at least a more “traditional” development path, moving from complex ball in their draft season to full-season ball in their first year post-draft and then reaching the upper minors within two full seasons of being drafted. While top high school players certainly fit that projection, many players selected are known to have a projected development path that will include multiple seasons either at complex level or short-season ball. Removing those leagues would make it more difficult for teams to draft players who project on that path, giving them a more likely path to college, where they could develop while playing college ball.
Another impact that hasn’t really been mentioned yet is that presently college baseball is the one aspect of baseball beyond high school that really is accessible in short travel to virtually anyone in the country. If the quality of college baseball is increasing, the attendance could certainly follow as well, giving college baseball more focus in the public sports sphere.
Impact on amateur baseball
While this is a broad category, it’s really not the only one left. We could go on for much longer on the impacts of this proposal, but hitting the high points right now should allow for an understanding of both the positive and negative aspects of the proposal.
While high school players may find their way to college more often, the potential loss of minor league clubs to communities could lead to much more interest in prep sports, especially in areas like the Carolinas, Tennessee, and other areas of the Southeast that are generally strong in high school baseball and would likely face losing teams with the Appalachian League and New York-Penn League being shut down.
Team USA’s collegiate team and the Cape Cod League could face some interesting decisions from players who are waiting for potential draft decisions or post-draft signing options for college underclassmen. Those players may be hesitant to commit to either summer experience if they could potentially be drafted or signed after the season/training started.
A final consideration is the Latin market. With no restrictions on the number of players under contract in Latin leagues or the number of teams that an organization could have in Latin America mentioned in the proposal, teams could take significant advantage of this and plant players in the Latin complex for multiple seasons when they’d typically advance to stateside short-season ball. While we’ve seen it in the past with players like Alex Reyes and Lucius Fox, American players with ties to a Latin country could be incentivized to enter pro ball through Latin American free agency rather than through the draft simply because current restrictions do not allow drafted players to play in Latin leagues.
We could also see teams invest in an additional league in another Latin country, though the political environment in many Latin countries currently would make a league questionable as MLB recently pulled out of Venezuela for that reason. Regardless, as currently written, Latin America could be an area where teams could dump significant money in their development program.
What is next for MLB and MiLB?
This is a preliminary proposal by Major League Baseball that is by no means the final agreement that will be put into place after the 2020 season. However, negotiations will likely be quite tense when the two sides pick up discussions at the winter meetings, likely to require significant time to iron out the details. Though from the reading and studying on the subject, it’d be very rare for a deal not to be reached before Minor League Baseball opens its 2020 season (the final season of the current deal) on April 9, 2020.
Until then, there will be plenty of leaks of this process for all of us to process. From this proposal, it’s clear we’re headed for some significant changes.