How the White Sox can find their next great hitter

[shipps]

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/01/15/sports/b...eball.html?_r=0

 

I think it was a Dodger scout that said this kid just flat out CANT play. I know I read it somewhere but I cant find it.

 

I dont think the cricket guys will translate over to baseball as some might think at first thought.

[Dick Allen]

I think it was a Dodger scout that said this kid just flat out CANT play. I know I read it somewhere but I cant find it.

 

I dont think the cricket guys will translate over to baseball as some might think at first thought.

Maybe someone will, but you are better off signing a guy like this than opening some academy trying to develop players who have never played playing against players who have never played.

[knightni]

I think it was a Dodger scout that said this kid just flat out CANT play. I know I read it somewhere but I cant find it.

Yankees

[Chisoxfn]

The Powell example is why it will take 10+ years to generate any sort of return, which indicates that the up front costs prior to any potential pay-off are significant. To be able to get these to work, you have to reach the youth cricket levels and convert those top players into baseball players and build them up from there. Than you are going to have to hit some guys who actually make majors, to create a potential pathway for others to look / gravitate towards. All the while you might put in this investment only to see an international draft pop up and thus all that money was spent for not (other than you do have additional contacts).

 

The reality is for this to be successful, baseball should invest in putting together facilities and resources in these parts and make it an MLB platform, leveraging MLB scouting channels and specific teams could send reps, etc, out and provide resources, but the best path to success is MLB driving this vs. individual clubs (and if you are going to grow the game, one can argue this is a good use of MLB's resources (i.e., all the owners essentially pay for this together butin theory benefit from it together as it provides potential path towards expanding market / driving global game).

[caulfield12]

The Powell is example is why it will take 10+ years to generate any sort of return, which indicates that the up front costs prior to any potential pay-off are significant. To be able to get these to work, you have to reach the youth cricket levels and convert those top players into baseball players and build them up from there. Than you are going to have to hit some guys who actually make majors, to create a potential pathway for others to look / gravitate towards. All the while you might put in this investment only to see an international draft pop up and thus all that money was spent for not (other than you do have additional contacts).

 

The reality is for this to be successful, baseball should invest in putting together facilities and resources in these parts and make it an MLB platform, leveraging MLB scouting channels and specific teams could send reps, etc, out and provide resources, but the best path to success is MLB driving this vs. individual clubs (and if you are going to grow the game, one can argue this is a good use of MLB's resources (i.e., all the owners essentially pay for this together butin theory benefit from it together as it provides potential path towards expanding market / driving global game).

 

Agree 100%.

 

As is, it's only the type of niche one of the richest trams could exploit...and then the door would quickly be shut if it proved too successful for being anti-competitive.

 

In the end, something like the NBA Developmental League or the European League for the NFL would have to be put in place in India first...and the talent level, salaries and general excitement level would have to be high enough in the beginning to attract more and more players and grow the league.

 

Then again, as John Cusack asserted over and over again in Say Anything, kickboxing's the sport of the future. He was twenty years off, but still prescient. Something seems ridiculous until it suddenly isn't.

 

 

[caulfield12]

Here's why I am picking India:

 

1) China already has NBA and then soccer/football that are far and away the two most popular sports for young boys today...

 

2) Taiwan already has baseball, but there's a tremendous amount of animosity between the two (Taiwan and China)...and the idea of "America's Pastime" being inculcated into the mainland culture is a bit hard to imagine, especially with both countries becoming more and more nationalistic in their rivalry. Baseball represents "western values," although I suppose you would have to say the same about basketball but that's overlooked because it's more of a global game already, versus something uniquely American.

 

3) Going along with Point 2, it's impossible to imagine baseball becoming more popular in China with a President Trump, as he's already threatened to put a huge tariff on imports and has railed incessantly about currency manipulation, unfair trading practices and the loss of manufacturing jobs.

 

After that, I'd probably go Brazil and Colombia. Australia was more of a hotbed in the 80's and 90's for baseball but that cooled off, and then you have the tremendous travel distance to consider. You could have C-Lee running a White Sox academy in Panama, that's another possibility...

 

 

 

As far as MLB International goes, the biggest irony here is that the most successful method of promoting baseball in China is one you would never think about and was almost entirely accidental.

 

It's primarily through fashion, with many South Korean stars (especially females) in the K-pop industry sporting major league baseball caps....and the export of the Korean culture (drama and K-pop music) has become hugely influential with other Asian countries, China in particular.

 

(Just like in the 90's and early 00's, you had many rappers sporting the White Sox caps, for example.)

 

There are actually quite a few stores here in mainland China selling jackets, caps and shirts...mostly the Yankees, that must be 50-60% of the market, then teams like the Mets, Dodgers, Cubs and Red Sox would probably be #2.

 

Of course, I'm not even sure what percentage of those kids in their teens and twenties and early 30's wearing that merchandise even know what sport it actually represents...they just think anything with NY or B or LA or whatever is cool/hip/trendy.