16:00: Minor League Baseball has formally announced the cancellation of its 2020 season.
12:15 pm: The 2020 minor league season will be canceled, according to a report by JJ Cooper and Josh Norris of Baseball America. Although widely expected, the news comes as a major blow to minor league teams and many young players who hoped to continue pursuing a coveted spot on the MLB roster.
This was already shaping up to be a tough campaign for minors long before the coronavirus was on anyone’s radar. When 2019 came to an end, a tense, high-profile battle was already underway regarding MLB’s plans to reduce the number of minor league affiliates.
The minor league baseball effort to defend its member teams was in great danger by the global pandemic. Public attention, for good reason, has been elsewhere. And minor league teams have experienced a more or less complete stoppage of revenue.
A restart of play could have helped. There were times when it seemed plausible, but any hope had dissipated in the past few weeks. Despite MLB and its players haggling over the terms for a major league resumption, an increase in virus transmission in many parts of the United States served to heighten the already great logistical challenges for a MiLB season.
We will see how the larger image turns out. For now, it’s a tough situation for youth clubs that are completely dependent on in-game game day revenue (and the publicity associated with the early viewer).
The situation is obviously also to the detriment of players who are now sitting at home without a clear path to play baseball in 2020. A limited number of prospects, generally those with clear paths to the majors, were invited to participate in the MLB summer camps and continuous training. But those who were not named for groups of 60-man players will have to be creative.
There is a potential indie ball outlet, but it is not likely to provide many opportunities. The Baseball America team has reported that some players are participating in local amateur leagues, although the level of competition will obviously not be up to the typical standard. Fortunately, most MLB teams agree to pay at least $ 400 weekly stipends to minor league players left in limbo. That is a help, but hardly a complete solution for those players who have not yet been released from their organizations.
