The List: Five Changes I’d Make If I Ran The Minors

I’m not Pat O’Conner, and I probably don’t have a very good chance to succeed him as the commissioner of Minor League Baseball. I’ve never run a league or a team and I didn’t go to law school, either. What I do have, however, is a solid decade of covering the minor leagues all over the country. I’ve been to 70 minor league parks (counting Arizona Fall League sites and minor league complexes) across 15 states. From Triple-A to Rookie-level to the instructional league, I’ve been around. All that, I think, makes me at least somewhat qualified to make a few suggestions as to how to improve the minor league experience.

With that in mind, here are a few ideas I’ve seen around the country that could and should be adopted into both current stadiums and into the ballparks that will be erected in the coming years.

1. The Return Of The Home Run Derby

In recent years, a great deal of minor league all-star games have gone away from the traditional home run derby in favor of hitting challenge. Instead of the league’s top sluggers trying to mash balls out of the yard, they’re trying to aim batting practice fastballs at a cavalcade of interns and mascots bouncing around the outfield in giant hamster balls and on trampolines. That certainly captures the unique bent of minor league baseball, but it’s not nearly as cool as a straight-up derby. Seeing Joey Gallo, Aaron Judge and Peter O’Brien rip balls 450 feet is far cooler than seeing them spray line drives at a variety of targets.

And while we’re at it, let’s get a little minor league flavor into the MLB version as well. Let’s face it: A lot of big leaguers don’t want to be involved in the home run derby. It’s tiresome, it can mess with their swing and the risk can far outweigh the reward. Players cite these concerns all the time when they back out. To alleviate that problem, let’s take the minor league home run leader at the time of the major league all-star break and get him into the MLB derby. It’s a great way to expose some of the game’s young talent to a huge audience, and you can bet that any minor leaguer would jump at the chance to knock a few balls out of a big league park.

2. Bring The Majors To The Minors

During the final few games of spring training every year, some teams leave their team’s spring training site and play a few games somewhere else before heading out for their first regular season game. The Mets this year played the Cubs for two games in Las Vegas‚ which worked because it’s the home of the Mets’ Triple-A affiliate and is the hometown of (among others) Cubs star third baseman Kris Bryant. The Phillies, too, got in on the fun. Their post-Clearwater slate included three games against a squad of their prospects. The second and third games were in Philadelphia, but their first stop was in Reading, Pa., the home of their Double-A affiliate.

The Mets and the Phillies each gave fans in their minor league markets a taste of the big club, which is especially admirable in the Mets’ case because fans in Vegas aren’t likely to get to Citi Field very often. These kinds of games should be an end-of-spring staple. Fans in Zebulon, N.C., never got to see Ozzie Albies play with the Mudcats. Why not give them that chance in late March when the Braves head north?

3. Turn It Down

Some sound effects during a ballgame enhance the experience and provide a little humor. A foul ball into the parking lot usually results in a shattered-glass noise played through the stadium speakers. And, if the team can pull it off, an ad for a local auto-glass repair outlet. When Salem’s Mike Meyers came to the plate last week in Winston-Salem, the audio/visual crew there cued up the themes from “Austin Powers” and “Halloween,” which was pretty clever. Those are examples of positive uses of noise in ballpark to keep fans engaged and entertained.

Sometimes, though, teams will go overboard. Fans (boing!) don’t (haw-haw!!) need (sad trombone) a sound effect (everybody clap your hands!) after every pitch. Certainly there are times where these clips can flow naturally, but inserting them after every few pitches dulls their effect and eventually becomes more annoyance than entertainment.

4. Create In-Stadium “Neighborhoods”

On my recent tour of Columbia’s new Spirit Communications Park, team owner Jason Freier pointed an intriguing and subtle design element that few will notice. The children’s play area is in left field, with all the inflatables and youngster could desire. In right-center field, there’s a fully-stocked island bar geared toward young adults. The batter’s eye is in between, effectively separating the two areas into different neighborhoods.

The dirty truth of the minor leagues is that it’s not about the baseball. It’s really just about having a nice place to have an affordable, fun night out, whether it’s with family or friends or by yourself. The game is the way to draw you in, but there’s so many other diversions—heck, you can play cornhole, shuffleboard, foosball or putt-putt golf at the Durham Bulls Athletic Park—to draw you away from the action on the field and keep fans of all levels entertained all evening long.

By adopting Columbia’s model, fans can co-mingle with their peers more easily. The 20-somethings looking to kick back with a cocktail won’t have to worry about getting in the way of the family with children who want nothing more than to spend a few minutes in a bouncy house and then use the rest of their times chasing mascots and shoveling down cotton candy and funnel cake. And for the hardcore fans who really are there to root for the home team, they can stay in the stands and enjoy every pitch.

One thing everybody can enjoy, however, is …

5.  Autographs

A lot of teams do this sporadically already, but minor league teams can and should make players available for autographs before or after games. It doesn’t have to be everybody, but making a couple of players available for 30 minutes or so before or after a game isn’t untenable. Even if it’s just one day a week, make it a regular basis and brand it as Signature Saturday or something. Limit it to one item per person per day to keep the line moving (and to avoid the binder-toting people whose sole intent is turn around and put the autograph on eBay). An autograph, whether it’s from a prospect or not, is a fantastic way to make a long-lasting memory for a young fan that could possibly hook them on the game long-term.