Are minor league baseball players exploited?

Dirk Hayhurst wrote up a good column for Bleacher Report (I know, ugh) about the conditions of minor league ballplayers. They aren't good.

http://bleacherreport.com/articles/2062307-an-inside-look-into-the-harsh-conditions-of-minor-league-baseball

 

Hey, they can quit if they don't like it.

 

THEY'RE GETTING A FREE .... Uh, never mind.

 

It's a good story, but it does leave out a significant point: the amount of bonus money many of these players get, which is supposed to help them fill in the gaps during their time in the minors. The slot value for the 200th pick of the draft (mid-seventh round) is $200,000. Even the last pick of the 10th round is slotted at $137,000. The international pool is different, but any serious prospect is getting six figures, in a place where most people don't see that in a lifetime.

Now, if you're a 25th-round pick or an undrafted free agent, you're not getting anything close to that. But at that point it becomes a matter of knowing the odds. A player who is not picked in the top 10 rounds has nothing more than a ghost of a chance of making it. So if you want to go for it, you have to be aware of that.

I coach youth baseball with a guy who pitched four years of Division I college and had a somewhat successful season in rookie ball. Certainly it was a dream he could have extended for a few years. But he said he looked at his manager, who was a career minor leaguer riding buses all night long and never seeing his kids, and knew he didn't want to go through that for the sliver of a chance he'd get to the show.

--But: The one thing that surprises me is that teams wouldn't devote more time and money to nutrition via the clubhouse spread. I would think that would benefit them a whole lot in the long run.

 

No, but sportswriters are.

 

When you're 17 and striking out 18 batters in a small-school prep game, you think you will be pitching at Petco Park someday. You don't grasp the fact that on that same day, 27 other guys around the country are striking out 18 batters in a top-level prep game.

Like any other major sport, the players are driven by an unrealistic view of their chances.

They still shouldn't be living on ramen noodles. Hayhurst makes very cogent points.

 

How is this any different than a band trying to make it? Either you're good enough or you're not. And until you find out, you have to go through the pains of paying your dues. I'm not about to cry a river for either.

 

Paying your dues means shut up and eat your PB&J.

 

In a sense Hayhurst was exploiting minor league players by
writing a book about them.

 

Turning pro definitely cost them a baseball scholarship.

 

Unless they already played in college. Plus, not too many of them receive full rides.

 

Your garage band probably doesn't play 140 dates with an average audience of 4,000 fans, either.