Saving Minor League Baseball

Saving the Minor Leagues: The Case for Radical Realignment

Saving Minor League Baseball

Major League Baseball continues its foolish quest to destroy professional baseball in towns across America.  Commissioner Rob Manfred is proposing a radical restructuring of the minor leagues with the stated goal of essentially eliminating 42 teams and decades-old leagues.  This agenda risks significant long-term damage to the game and could inadvertently produce the final century of baseball as we know it.  Yet, if restructuring is truly the goal, there is another option.

MLB’s Diabolical Plan

Manfred seems intent on realigning the minors. MLB claims three primary reasons for seeking realignment:

1. The wear and tear travel takes on prospects,
2. The goal to pay affiliated minor-league players a higher yearly wage, and
3. That too many players will never make big league rosters.

This author previously addressed the faults with MLB’s stated justifications.  However, it seems money is likely the true driver of this dubious contraction proposal.

For our purposes today, let us take the first reason given on face value.  Fourteen leagues operate across North America. They vary in size from eight to 16 teams.  The larger leagues encompass multiple states, sometimes with distances between teams of more than 1,000 miles.  Because of these geographic gaps, clubs have high travel costs and players face lengthy travel.

Moreover, the AA leagues are concentrated in the eastern half of the country.  Many prospects are called up directly from AA. The current geographic distribution gives an unfair competitive advantage to eastern and central clubs over their western counterparts.

An Alternative Proposal

However, there is some legitimate usefulness in reform. For your consideration, here is a proposal to create 20 leagues of eight teams each.  These leagues will be geographically compact. The levels of play will be more evenly distributed throughout the United States and Canada.  As much as possible, teams from the same state will be placed in the same league.

This requires reclassifying some teams.  For clarity’s sake, we will do away with the confusing present situation of multiple levels of A ball.  Instead, the teams will be grouped into five levels:  AAA, AA, A, B, and C (a nod to history).

Therefore, to make the numbers work, the new Wichita team joins C ball. The Jacksonville Jumbo Shrimp get bumped up to AAA. Swaths of the Midwest and South are reclassified.  Addressing the AA situation in one fell swoop, the entire California League joins that level.  This move gives all eight Pacific and Mountain MLB teams an opportunity to have western AA affiliates.

Present leagues will continue in their altered form.  For instance, your favorite leagues, from the Appalachian to the Pacific Coast, will survive.  The names for the six new leagues necessitated by this plan will harken to their geography or a formerly defunct league of yesteryear.  Baseball history fans may enjoy the return of the Federal League and American Association.

Because this is just one author’s dream, this realignment takes place under the MLB realignment proposal described here.  Under these combined plans, fans receive two new MLB teams, no minor-league teams are contracted, the travel burden is reduced, and a certain city north of the border with a proud baseball history might just see a return to the diamant…

AAA

AA

A

B

C

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