When Baseball Becomes Polo, the Shrinking of Our National Pastime

Let me get this straight… under the cloak of the coronavirus, Major League Baseball is moving ahead with a controversial plan to cut 42 minor league teams from its ranks, a reduction of some 25%. The move, suggested last winter, had been broadly objected to by players, fans and Congress. Congress even formed a task force to study the decision’s economic impact, with the stated objective of saving those threatened teams.

As the economy reeled from the effects of the pandemic, attention shifted to more vital interests and Minor League Baseball, seeing its leverage vanish, reluctantly agreed to the cuts. The loss of those teams, and the vacancy in the small cities and towns that they occupied, maybe temporarily moderated by some form of independent league or association, but without an affiliation with Major League Baseball, their futures are unquestionably dim.

In a separate but related move, MLB shortened its amateur draft from 40 rounds to 5 rounds in 2020 and 20 rounds in 2021. While the reductions are sunset in 2022, there is little reason to believe that some form of abbreviation won’t be made permanent. The stated intention of both of these moves was to save the MLB money, this year and in the future, and to prepare for the coming negotiations with the MLB Player’s Association over the terms of their new contract in 2022.

The cuts in minor league teams will reduce the number of jobs in professional baseball by some 1,000 players, and put another 300+ coaches, administrators and executives on the shelf. That number doesn’t count the hundreds of workers at the stadiums, or the local businesses that will be affected. In an economic crisis where almost 40 million Americans are unemployed, those numbers are a tiny fraction, but their meaning might well be greater culturally than we understand.

Why Baseball Matters…

As a sport, baseball has been referred to as our national pastime for good reason. Some 15 million children across the country play organized the ball, an increase of 3 million over the past five years. Overseas, baseball is the most popular sport in a number of countries, an American export that has been an unmitigated positive for decades. In the Caribbean and South American countries, the idea of their best playing in a major league stadium is as inspiring as any part of the American story, and star players from other nations are both heroes, and notoriously generous in the sharing of their rewards back home.

Domestically, the picture of a small, green patch of baseball in a minor league city is a beloved piece of Americana, a Norman Rockwell painting come to life. It is also something more than that: a broad economic participant, as noted by that congressional report:

“Whereas 40 million-plus fans have attended Minor League Baseball games each season for 15 consecutive years;

Whereas Minor League Baseball provides wholesome affordable entertainment in 160 communities throughout the country;

Whereas, in 2018, Minor League Baseball clubs donated over $45 million in cash and in-kind gifts to their local communities and completed over 15,000 volunteer hours;”

All of this, while important, is secondary. It is the place that baseball occupies in the nation’s psyche, the generational image that it brings immediately to mind, that makes the sport an essential part of our culture. It is as much a boy with a broomstick, swinging at a folded up sock as it is a millionaire pitching to another millionaire. It is, in a country constantly struggling with the meaning of our recreations, our least violent and most historically resonant of our major sports. It is all that, and more… it is, in important ways, dying.

How Can a Growing Sport be Dying?

Parents of young athletes across the country are moving their children away from football, concerned over the growing awareness of potential brain damage. Baseball has been the primary beneficiary of that movement, growing by almost the same amount that football has reduced.

With the expansion of youth and scholastic baseball has also come an increase in the competition for slots on high school teams and college scholarships. This competition has led to an explosion of costly forms of additional training, from private instruction to travelling teams, where families often spend thousands of dollars in pursuit of competitive advantage. Other enhancements, such as pricey equipment, backyard rigs and specialized training tools, are exploding in what has become a multi-billion dollar marketplace.

With the coming reduction in opportunities, the concentration of MLB will focus more on college players, transferring the emphasis from all but the most developed high school stars. This will increase the emphasis on those expensive competitive advantages, as ambitious players (and their parents) look for every edge. Already, there are some high school coaches requiring that their players play on a travel team in the off-season, and encourage private coaches and camps, creating a financial burden on those families between $2,500 and $5,000 per year, or more if the families want to go full bore.

Adding together the ever-increasing costs for bats, gloves and other equipment to the seeming requirements for high-end instruction and exposure, supporting an ambitious youth player might cost well over $25-$30,000 before he is even eligible for a college scholarship. Baseball risks becoming a sport for the elite, where a majority of kids either are excluded from success or don’t try because of the perception of the costs. As the sport splits between the haves and the have nots, the dreams of millions of little league shortstops and pitchers will change, and a sports fantasy uniquely available to every size of the kid will become more remote.

The Shrinking Of Baseball is Accelerating.

The drastic reduction in entry-level positions — what MLB refers to as “internships” when they get before Congress and ask for more relief from labour laws and antitrust regulations — will have a disproportionate effect on foreign players. Already, decisions made to reduce the bonuses paid to non-American prospects have curtailed the presence of academies and support systems across the hemisphere, limiting opportunities for exposure (and sometimes, good nutrition and education) for thousands of young players.

Consider that foreign-born player, often lacking an opportunity to play in American colleges, are customarily selected as teenagers, the absence of the lower rung slots are critical to teams open to giving them a shot at developing under quality coaching. Knowing that a foreign-born player will be more difficult and costly to develop now, the shift in scouting resources and bonus allocations is predictable.

A smaller percentage of the best athletes entering into baseball’s pathways. A diminishing hold of baseball on the shared experiences of millions of Americans, young and old, in small towns. A growing perception of baseball as an elite sport, with the cultural obstacles that portends. The drastic reduction of baseball as even a possible dream for so many young athletes in so many countries. Baseball is pointing to a smaller, less important future, an outcome that it is hastening by its every move.

What Might Come Next for the Sport?

There is a theory in economics that supply creates opportunity. One possible outcome of MLB’s moves might well be the creation of legitimate competition, another league or leagues that are finally able to make and keep a public attachment. Imagine that the number of players, deeply invested in their craft but without an outlet, are offered a chance to play in a new league. It might be a newly well-financed independent league, one that overnight doubles its teams and inhabits dozens of now-vacant minor league stadia. It might be from whole hog, an association of detached minor league teams across the country.

Another possibility would be the expansion and again, the increase in financial support for an international league. There are presences in both Mexico and Canada that could be the foundation of substantial promotions, and if MLB experiences a work stoppage in 2022 — not an unlikely outcome — the door could open to wider awareness and support. There is a strong existing following for baseball around the world; America’s hold on the top of the sport has been taken for granted, and might not be permanent.

Sadly, perhaps the most likely outcome for the coming years is the simplest one. Baseball will continue its present momentum, consolidating its presence and diminishing its relevancy in ways that will be damaging and long-lasting. As a generation of young sees pursuing the sport as an athletic dead end, or worse, out of reach because of their finances… as millions of adults forget the experience of sitting in stands and chomping on a hot dog while booing an umpire… baseball will lose some of its hold on the American imagination, it's a unique place in the culture. It will become a smaller thing, and the country will be a little poorer as a result.