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Minor League Upheaval


pcq

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Is in progress. Twins are pulling out of Rochester hoping for St. Paul. Nationals are leaving Fresno maybe for Richmond. The upshot is that teams are being asked to localize their affiliates which could one day uproot the Sox base in NC with three teams. Possibly 40 teams are facing contraction, many involving the short season leagues who may turn into collegiate summer leagues. Some of the larger cities could end up like Fresno which will now have an A ball team. I foresee Rochester angling for an AA Eastern League entry. Throw in the heartbreak of a cancelled season and you have a confusingly fluid situation. Other cities are waiting for the hammer to fall from the secret list. MLB now calls the shots under a new agreement controlling the minors. In sum you have contraction, localizing, short season moving to spring camps and Covid leaving a murky mess. 

Edited by pcq
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One hopeful benefit of MLB taking over MILB is hopefully a little investment in the MILB.tv product (if there is a season in 2021). The setup to watch MLB.tv is awesome. The setup for MILB.tv is terrible. Give me a Roku app and the ability to stream those games easily.

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1 hour ago, Heads22 said:

One hopeful benefit of MLB taking over MILB is hopefully a little investment in the MILB.tv product (if there is a season in 2021). The setup to watch MLB.tv is awesome. The setup for MILB.tv is terrible. Give me a Roku app and the ability to stream those games easily.

After they unveiled the updated version of the MiLB app in 2019 it was a giant POS. Hopefully they could work on something much smoother.

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3 hours ago, claydude14 said:

The local media here named the White Sox as a dark horse team for Rochester’s Triple A club. I didn’t take it with a grain of salt with all their other teams being down south. 

I'd be surprised, I think they like their Carolina set-up.

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4 hours ago, claydude14 said:

The local media here named the White Sox as a dark horse team for Rochester’s Triple A club. I didn’t take it with a grain of salt with all their other teams being down south. 

That would be awesome. Frontier field is not a bad stadium

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From a pure marketing standpoint I would think the Sox would garner more attention (and butts in the seats) if they moved their affiliates closer to home like many others have. 

If you look at the AAA clubs, 8 out of 30 were in the same state their home club. Another 9 were within a 5 hour drive away.

 

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2 minutes ago, jasonxctf said:

From a pure marketing standpoint I would think the Sox would garner more attention (and butts in the seats) if they moved their affiliates closer to home like many others have. 

If you look at the AAA clubs, 8 out of 30 were in the same state their home club. Another 9 were within a 5 hour drive away.

 

The Sox really valued the fact they could move their kids around in short order within the entire system.  I think I remember reading that if you dropped Arizona and Great Falls, the rest of the teams were within a four hour drive of each other.

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IIRC wasnt the Iowa Oaks the Sox AAA team in the 70's? ANd now the cubs have their AAA team there. Who is the Indianapolis team affliated with?

Yes a shame as where I live, the Beloit A team is 40 min drive just built a new park, on city funds I assume and the other way is Clinton IA and they have a great following in A league as well

 

 

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4 minutes ago, The Grinder said:

IIRC wasnt the Iowa Oaks the Sox AAA team in the 70's? ANd now the cubs have their AAA team there. Who is the Indianapolis team affliated with?

Yes a shame as where I live, the Beloit A team is 40 min drive just built a new park, on city funds I assume and the other way is Clinton IA and they have a great following in A league as well

 

 

The Indianapolis Indians are a Pirates farm club, have been for a number of years.

And the Iowa Oaks were a Sox farm team in the 70's and early 80's I believe.

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15 minutes ago, jasonxctf said:

From a pure marketing standpoint I would think the Sox would garner more attention (and butts in the seats) if they moved their affiliates closer to home like many others have. 

If you look at the AAA clubs, 8 out of 30 were in the same state their home club. Another 9 were within a 5 hour drive away.

 

There is definitely a lack of AAA and AA teams in the area, at least reasonable driving distance.  The Cougars attempted this synergy with the Cubs, it had only a minor effect on their attendance and the Cubs bailed quickly to South Bend.

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8 hours ago, claydude14 said:

The local media here named the White Sox as a dark horse team for Rochester’s Triple A club. I didn’t take it with a grain of salt with all their other teams being down south. 

I think Pittsburgh could be more likely sent there but they might have to wait a year. MLB can order people around but how quickly. Sox have a nice set-up in NC. The next couple weeks a lot of moves could be announced. The Yankees just ditched nearby AA Trenton for a more affluent community.  I also question if there will be fans Opening Day, which seems too tentative.

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2 hours ago, ThirdGen said:

The Indianapolis Indians are a Pirates farm club, have been for a number of years.

And the Iowa Oaks were a Sox farm team in the 70's and early 80's I believe.

It might make sense to put the Sox in Indy and Pirates to Roch. Indiana has some Sox connections.

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