Negro League reclassified as major league

[Can_of_corn]

3 minutes ago, DrungoHazewood said:

Oh... (pun intended).  They're not going to make NPB and KBO majors, that would be elevating the competition.  People would start clamoring for an all-Major League Championship.  Players might start wondering what it's like to shun lowball North American MLB contracts to go to the other Major Leagues. Ichiro would become the all time hit leader, leading to a Pete Rose tantrum.

The Negro Leagues were safe to promote since they stopped being a thing well over a half century ago.

That's already happening.  The team construction in the KBO/NPB should limit that.

Carter Stewart update.

https://www.baseball-reference.com/register/player.fcgi?id=stewar004car

[DrungoHazewood]

54 minutes ago, Can_of_corn said:

That's already happening.  The team construction in the KBO/NPB should limit that.

Carter Stewart update.

https://www.baseball-reference.com/register/player.fcgi?id=stewar004car

I wonder how long until NBP or KBO relax the foreign player restrictions?  They need to be careful, having a league to themselves does probably help with growing talent.  Kids know that there's less of a chance of them being displaced by Renato Nunez type players from abroad.

Related observation... I looked up Sadaharu Oh's numbers, and he hit 868 homers playing in 130-140 game schedules.  If you extrapolate to reasonable playing time in 162-game schedules he ends up with just over 1000 homers, and 10 or 11 50-homer seasons.  He had a 1.080 OPS in a 22-year career.  Nine full seasons with a slugging percentage over .700.  Yea, not 2000-era MLB talent levels in those leagues, but still impressive.  In MLB history there have been about 36 player-seasons over .700 slugging.

[Just Regular]

1 hour ago, Can_of_corn said:

That's already happening.  The team construction in the KBO/NPB should limit that.

Carter Stewart update.

https://www.baseball-reference.com/register/player.fcgi?id=stewar004car

67 innings a nice total for a 20-year old in 2020.

Maybe in five years the Orioles get their version of McWilliams outearning Alonso and have salaries like:

Stewart - $20M+

Hall - Arb1 1.5M

Rodriguez - Club3 - 600K

Grayson and Hall did get their bonuses in the bank earlier, but this story says Stewart got more there too https://calltothepen.com/2020/05/16/carter-stewart-man-ahead-time/

I'm fuzzy on if NPB 2020 is Year 1 or Year 2 of his 6-year contract, or if his club could post him before free agency ala Sugano to "get something" ala Mookie/Lindor for an expiring contract.   I hadn't thought about the old trope of Americans invent Model T's and Japanese perfect Toyotas in awhile, but if the Driveline-type stuff like that scales, goodness gracious.

All that said, High School Class of 2018 so his arm could still detonate any minute.   He and Rodriguez only two weeks apart on the exact DOB thing for 2018 draftees.  

 

[Sports Guy]

It’s a publicity stunt 

[DrungoHazewood]

A long time ago Bill James made a list of criteria to subjectively judge the quality of a league and help judge if it meets major league standards.  I think it was part of an article showing that the 1884 Union Association was major league in the same way your local high school team is in the majors.  I couldn't find that, but earlier this year I made up my own for some other purpose.  I think it would be useful to go through this for the Negro Leagues that have been elevated to MLB status:

1. How well are the players paid compared to an average US worker?

Probably okay, but nowhere near a MLB player of that era.

2. Are the stadiums temporary, more permanent, and are they shared with other activities? Are they $billion cathedrals, or bleachers thrown up last Thursday?

All over the place.  They played in MLB parks like Griffith Stadium and the Polo Grounds, but also little ramshackle places.

3. How organized is scouting compared to 2020?

Not well at all.

4. What is the average attendance?

All over the place.  Some games sold out MLB stadiums.  I'm sure others had dozens of fans. 

5. What kind of cities does the league represent? The biggest cities, just smaller towns, or a mix? Geographically constrained, or country-wide?

Mostly MLB cities in the East.  But comparable to the AL/NL in most cases.

6. What population base does the player pool draw from? Do substantial numbers of young people strive to be in this league?

Similar to the MLBs, but of course African Americans were 10% of the population.  They also drew from Latin America and the Carribbean earlier and more often than the majors.  I'd assume young kids wanted badly to play with Josh Gibson and Satchel Paige.

7. How does the league collect, process, and use information technology?

Compared to today barely at all.  Compared to the majors of the era... somewhat worse due to limited resources?

8. How well does the transportation infrastructure support the league?

Pretty well, except that buses and trains were segregated which I'm sure was a limiting factor and it sucked.

9. What is the pipeline from amateur ranks to this league look like? Multiple organized steps, high school kids going straight to the league, or some kind of a mix?

I don't think the Negro Leagues had minor league affiliates, or if they did it wasn't nearly to the extent the majors did by the 1940s.  It was common for teenagers to sign directly with Negro League teams.

10. Are front offices robust, or threadbare?

Trending more towards threadbare.

11. What is the coverage in the media like?

In the African American press pretty robust.  Some coverage in mainstream papers. 

12. What percentage of the best players in the world play in this league?

Based on 1960 percentages I'd say 30%, give or take.

13. What is the spread in age? Are there a lot of teenagers and/or 40-somethings in the league?

It was commonplace for 18-year-olds to be on the field with 46-year-olds.  This is a fairly big hit on Negro League quality of play.  There were guys in their mid-to-late-40s hitting over .300 and playing regularly.  That's not a sign of a major league as we understand it today.  It's what you might see in 1895.  Apparently Hank Aaron won the batting title in 1951 at the age of 17, of course after many players had left the league to join the MLBers and affiliates.

14. How long has the league existed?

Before 1920 the Negro Leagues were pretty disorganized, with many independent clubs.  They lasted in some form or another until about 1960, but really tailed off starting in 1948.  Which is probably why they decided to grant MLB status to 1920-48, even if that is an oversimplification.

15.  What is the spread in talent?

You had inner circle HOFers playing alongside 16-year-old kids, and guys who'd be in A ball in an affiliated setting.  So very wide.  Similar to the Japanese Leagues, or 19th century baseball.

16. What is the spread in results at a team level?

Much wider than today.  Picking a random year... 1925 Eastern Colored League.  Hilldale went 53-18-1 (.746), Lincoln Giants went 7-41 (.146).

17. What was scheduling like?

From my perspective, weird and random.  Teams often didn't play nearly the same schedule or number of games in the same league.  It appears teams showed up and dropped out in mid-season pretty frequently.  Official schedules were 40, 60, 80 games, rarely longer than that.  And teams filled in the schedule playing many exhibitions and barnstorming games.  Apparently some teams played 200+ games, but only a small percentage were league games.  Many similarities to 19th century MLB.

[SteveA]

An interesting opinion piece that doesn't touch on the issues discussed here, but that it is a hollow and self-serving gesture by MLB:

https://www.espn.com/mlb/story/_/id/30540089/mlb-add-negro-leagues-official-records-never-change-did-black-players

[DrungoHazewood]

14 hours ago, SteveA said:

An interesting opinion piece that doesn't touch on the issues discussed here, but that it is a hollow and self-serving gesture by MLB:

https://www.espn.com/mlb/story/_/id/30540089/mlb-add-negro-leagues-official-records-never-change-did-black-players

One of the enduring challenges to humanity are how we deal with issues that linger today but were created by people who've been dead for a very, very long time.  Most of the options we have are partial, flawed solutions.