MLB to Small Town America: Drop Dead

1) MLB doesn't know who those 5% are going to be
2) That as yet undetermined 5% need people to play against

 

Manfred: We Don’t Need No Stinkin’ Minor Leagues

 

I love MLB’s threat that that they will go to independent leagues or towns that don’t already have teams. Do they really think, after these threats of contraction, that communities are going to be willing to invest millions in stadiums or upgrades?

 

I read long ago in one of the Bill Veeck books that Japanese pro teams, instead of AAA minor league affiliates, have reserve teams which play before (or after) the parent teams play.

I suppose MLB could try that approach.

 

Manfred is a pud, but he's not to blame for this. There's no way this isn't ultimately coming from ownership.

 

2020 Draft moved to Omaha, site of College WS

Hard not to see this as a signal to turn colleges into more of a pipeline. I'm sure teams have analyzed the development cost/benefit analysis, let someone else pay those costs and get a better read on how they will perform on players they may face in the pro ranks.

This is from Baseball America (2018)

Draftees By Source

As is almost always the case, the vast majority of draftees were picked out of four-year colleges. Roughly two out of every three players came from a four-year college.

Type Players Pct

4YR 805 66.3

HS 304 25.0

JC 103 8.5

Other 2 0.2

This year’s draft class saw the highest number of four-year college players selected since 2012, which marks the beginning of the “bonus pool allotment” era of the draft. The previous high occurred in 2015, when 776 college players (or 63.9 percent) were taken.

On the flip side, this year saw the fewest high school players picked under the current draft format. The previous low was 312 (or 25.7 percent) in 2017.

But overall, the 2018 draft distribution fell in line with the three-year averages for 2015-17, which were 63 percent college, 26 percent high school, 10 percent junior college and a handful of “other.”

Digging a little deeper, it’s quite clear that high school players are either picked very early (where they will land large signing bonuses) or quite late (where they may or may not sign). In the first and supplemental first rounds of 2018, there were actually more high school players picked (53.5 percent) than college players (46.5 percent).

By the second and third rounds, the preference shifts back to college players, by a margin of 67 percent to 31 percent.

And from the fourth through the 10th rounds, where lower-cost college senior signs become popular, high school draftees are scarce. Collegians account for 81 percent and high schoolers 15 percent during these rounds.

Once the 11th round is reached, where there are no longer any slot allotment penalties, teams start picking high school players again. Some of them will be taken in the 11th-15th rounds to land significant signing bonuses. Others will be picked in the later rounds even though teams know there is very little chance they will sign. There also are occasionally some hidden gems in these rounds who an area scout knows about but no else does. The distribution from rounds 11-40 looks like this:

Type Players Pct

4YR 581 63.8

HS 233 25.6

JC 94 10.3

Other 2 0.2

 

Sounds like pro baseball will look a lot like English football in about 10 years. Not altogether a bad thing. Sever the farm relationships and let the current minor franchises sink or swim. Set up pro-rel with a chance to reach AAA (making The Show a part of it is a step too far right now).

 

I could see each MLB franchise fielding its varsity team of 25 players, a JV team of 25 players, and a developmental squad of 25 more players which would work out and play year round at the training sites in Florida and Arizona.

Everybody else would play for independent teams which would then SELL their top prospects to the majors.

The major league draft would be limited to about 10 rounds every year. Those players would go directly to the developmental squads.

Undrafted players would sign with independent minor league franchises on two year contracts. During the contract, the minor league team could sell the player to an MLB organization at whatever price they could get (the player would also get a percentage as a bonus).

At the end of the two year contract players would be eligible for a secondary draft; the independent minor league teams would get a set price for each player drafted.

 

That's all fine, but I don't think college baseball is enough of a revenue generator that a lot of schools will want to plow multi millions into greatly expanding their programs to fulfill the same roles as talent generators for professional franchises as they do in football and basketball.
And as long as the regular season ends in early May, when it's still sleeting in half the country, I don't see that changing much -- certainly not for schools in the north.

 

That's the thing - they don't have to. The NCAA only gives schools 15 or so scholarships for baseball that have to be divvied up. A lot of these players have already shown they are willing to pay to play.

 

This is not that bad of an idea.

It takes a player three years to develop in the minors. You keep an A, AA and AAA club. Give each one 30 man rosters. That gives you four starting first basemen in your organization.

Let's say all the low A places are gone. Those teams become regional teams where local players who were not drafted get to play on independent teams. You're going to get players that were overlooked in the shorter draft to thrive on these teams.

I honestly think instead of having a bunch of low A players from places most locals have never heard from and having a team built of players who graduated from local high schools and colleges would be a lot more fun to watch. Then these players could sign at the end of the season with MLB vlubs and compete on one of their A, AA or AAA clubs.

 

The independent minor league teams would be free to assemble their teams however they saw fit -- to really try to win.
They could make trades among the other minor league franchises, try to fill holes, etc etc.
Of course there would be pressure to sell off your good players to the majors to make money, but you could use proceeds from those sales to pick up a couple better guys for next season.

I'd put in a rule that any player purchased directly from a minor league franchise after July 4 must go immediately on the MLB varsity roster and must play some nominal amount, or be returned.

That would be a disincentive for teams snatching a minor league MVP candidate out of the middle of a pennant race to sit on the end of a major league bench for three weeks.