garnetpalmetto
Jerkministrator
I just read this article in Baseball America and it's something - the most radical change to Minor League ball since the last major reclassification occured in 1962. It's a lot to take in, but as MLB and MiLB are in the process of negotiating an extension to the Professional Baseball Agremeent (PBA), the document that controls the relationship between MLB and MiLB teams, MLB has floated a series of proposals to accomplish a few goals, namely to enhance the playing experience for MiLB players, to shorten travel times, and to provide better geographic affiliations between MLB clubs and their affiliates. The proposal includes the following, the fine details of which aren't all clear:
- 42 MiLB teams would be eliminated - short season leagues other than the complex-rookie leagues would be eliminated. That means the Appalachian League, New York-Penn League, Northwest League, and Pioneer League would cease to exist in their current forms. The Northwest League, however, would be made into a full season league.
- The Low-A, High-A, Double-A, and Triple-A classification would stay the same.
- Leagues would change in size with new Leagues being created in the name of making leagues more geographically compact. For instance, the low-A South Atlantic League would shrink from a 14-team league to a 6-team league with a new Mid-Atlantic League absorbing some of its teams. The 14-team Pacific Coast League would shrink to 10-teams while the 16-team International League would grow to a 20-team league.
- At the outset, some teams would change classifications with some teams moving from A to AAA (the mention of this immediately made me think of the Dayton Dragons) while some would move down from AAA to A. To facilitate this, a valuation system would be created where the Triple-A class is valued at $20M, Double-A at $15M, Advanced A at $10M, Low A at $8M, and Short Season/Rookie at $6M. A team moving from Low A to Triple-A, for instance, would have to pay $12M to move up while a team moving from Triple-A to Double-A would receive $5M in compensation.
- Not all current full season teams would survive and some Short Season/Rookie teams would move up to take their places. An invitation to the Atlantic League's Sugar Land Skeeters and the American Association's St. Paul Saints to become affiliated teams would be made.
- The 42 markets left without affiliated teams would be put in a new quasi-independent Dream League, a joint MLB-MiLB venture where players who go undrafted in the MLB Draft (which would be moved to August and shortened to 20-25 rounds) would be given the option to play. That said it's unlikely teams in the Pioneer or Appalachian League would be able to have the financial backing to play in the League so they would be encouraged to form collegiate wooden-bat leagues (like the Cape Cod League or the Coastal Plain League) operated under the auspices of MLB.
- MLB teams would be limited to fielding 5 minor league teams and would be limited to 150 players on a minor league contract.
- The 2-year PDC system that currently exists would be replaced by longer franchise agreements designed to give the MLB clubs more certainty, but would eliminate some of the leverage MiLB teams hold in the process.
- This extension of the PBA would only be for 5-years rather than 7-years as has been the case in the past
Since 1903, there has always been an agreement between MLB and MiLB. There was a contentious PBA negotiation in 1990, which ended with MLB receiving a ticket tax from MiLB teams, eliminated payments from MLB to MiLB for player transactions and implemented requirements for significant facility improvements. But before that and since then, new PBA agreements and renewals have generally been uncontentious affairs with relatively few adjustments.
This PBA negotiation has already turned contentious. MiLB has long said that it sees the need for improved facility standards—something that has not been significantly changed since the 1990 PBA—but in general, MiLB is quite happy with the current arrangement.
MLB is not happy with the current structure. In the view of some MLB owners and front office officials, the current system, where MLB teams and MiLB clubs negotiate every two years to sign two-year Player Development Contracts, leaves MLB clubs in undesirable situations from facilities and geographical standpoints. In a number of cases over the past decade, MLB owners have ended up purchasing MiLB teams to avoid ending up in what are viewed as some of the worst stadiums around minor league baseball.
In MLB’s viewpoint, roughly a quarter of all current MiLB clubs far fall below the level of facilities they view as needed for their minor league players. MLB has essentially put the onus on MiLB to find a way to guarantee those stadiums will all reach what MLB deems as acceptable standards in the near future. If MiLB cannot, then MLB has a proposal to simply reduce the number of affiliated minor league teams going forward to the 75 percent of MiLB clubs that MLB deems capable of meeting their facility needs. MLB would work with MiLB and others to ensure the remaining 25 percent of clubs have baseball teams of some sort, but they would no longer be affiliated MiLB clubs.
MLB also wants to completely rework the PDC process to ensure MLB clubs can have MiLB affiliates that meet their desires geographically. To do so, they want to eliminate the current two-year PDC process and replace it with much longer-lasting MLB-MiLB franchise agreements. Doing so would give the MLB clubs much more certainty, but it would also eliminate the negotiating leverage MiLB teams currently have every two years.
And MLB wants MiLB to share in the increased costs that are going to come with increased player pay. In MLB's view, there may be several ways to reach these goals, but their initial proposal is one path to those goals.