Look Who’s Blogging Now: Minor League Player Blogs [Part 1]

June 21st, 2009

June 21, 2009 — Minor League Baseball has jumped onto the blogging bandwagon, finally. Compared to 2008, when they recruited a grand total of five journals, the new-look MiLB.com boasts 23 ballplayer-bloggers. Of course quantity is not the same as quality, so how does the bigger, better bush-league blogosphere measure up?

I should begin this little exercise with a disclaimer. Along with being a writer, I’ve also been paid at one point or another in my career to coach athletics and tutor English. As you know, or should by now, . . .and if not, go look around for heaven’s sake, um, . . .where was I? Oh, right. At any rate, the motto around here at TSJ is “athletes come first.”

Technical

Creative

Overall

It would be far too easy (not to mention self-important) to throw out a bunch of judge’s scorecards and declare mission accomplished. Instead, I’m hoping this review will:

• Provide a little showcase for these labors of love; it’s not like the ballplayers get a performance bonus for putting up good stats in word counts or fan comments.
• Highlight the bloggers who put a little extra into their work; you know, stuff like originality, sweat, information, creativity, intelligence (blogging is a brain game, after all).
• Induce some grins to go along with constructive tips on how these burgeoning bloggers might improve their work; I mean, if it were you, wouldn’t you prefer the same consideration?

OK, on to the show. Because of the size of the database, I’ve organized the review into sections. This first part is a statistical overview, no critiques of content. Just the facts, in other words.

Results

Let’s start by taking a look at who’s in the mix and how they’re distributed. . .by MLB division, position, competition level. You’ll notice each blogger’s name includes a link to their site so you can visit and follow along as we go.  I purposely did not include blog titles, those will be discussed when I start reviewing the individual blogs.

NATIONAL LEAGUE
Author	Pos	Level	Team	Div
Daniel Moskos	LHP	AA	Pittsburgh Pirates	Central
Casey Weathers	RHP	DL	Colorado Rockies	West
Daniel Schlereth	LHP	AA	Arizona Diamondbacks	West
David Kopp	RHP	AA	St. Louis Cardinals	Central
David Matranga	2B	AAA	Florida Marlins	East
Quintin Berry	OF	AA	Philadelphia Phillies	East
Dan Dorn	OF	AAA	Cincinnati Reds	Central
gJavy Guerra	RHP	A	Los Angeles Dodgers	West
Matt Young	OF	AA	Atlanta Braves	East
Bobby Scales	2B	MLB	Chicago Cubs	Central
Brett Lawrie	C	A	Milwaukee Brewers	Central
Greg Burke	RHP	AAA	San Diego Padres	West

Missing: Houston Astros (Central), New York Mets (East), San Francisco Giants (West), Washington Nationals (East)

AMERICAN LEAGUE
Author	Pos	Level	Team	Div
Chris Hayes	RHP	AAA	Kansas City Royals	Central
Chris Rosenbaum	C	Adv-A	Los Angeles Angels	West
Neil Wagner	RHP	AAA	Cleveland Indians	Central
Matt Cusick	2B	Adv-A	New York Yankees	East
Sean Doolittle	OF	AAA	Oakland A’s	West
Beau Vaughan	RHP	AAA	Texas Rangers	West
Trevor Plouffe	SS	AAA	Minnesota Twins	Central
Gordon Beckham	SS	AAA	Chicago White Sox	Central
Dennis Raben	OF	Short-A	Seattle Mariners	West
Justin Turner	2B	AAA	Baltimore Orioles	East
Casper Wells	OF	AA	Detroit Tigers	Central

Missing: Boston Red Sox (East), Tampa Bay Rays (East), Toronto Blue Jays (East)

Analysis

As you can see from the pie graphs, Western division teams, in both leagues, offer the best blog selection. This was a completely unexpected result, and I haven’t been able to come up with a reasonable hypothesis. Longer bus/plane rides? Higher percentage of English majors drafted? More hitter-friendly, high-altitude ballparks? Who knows? If there is a P.I. out there with grant money to fund further research into this curious phenomenon, please post your comment below. I promise to respond in 48 hours.

It is particularly interesting to note who’s missing from the list. The American League East has the weakest showing, with all three no-shows coming from the Eastern Division, and most notably Boston. Those of you who are Angels and/or Yankees fans, you may be gloating right now. Bear in mind, though, we’re still in the minors.

More pitchers feel the urge to put their thoughts down in print. You have to wonder, aside from PFPs and maybe BP, what else do they have to do between starting or relief appearances? Because of their reputation for being thinking men-athletes, catchers were counted separately from the rest of the position players. They may be the brainiest, however it appears as though they prefer to keep their thoughts to themselves. Only one backstop from each league. It should be pointed out this might have been a constraint mandated by MiLB editorial staff, only one catcher on the playing field =  only one catcher/league on the blogroll.

Most of the bloggers come from the Triple-A levels, nationwide. I cannot think of any reason why MiLB would have a preference for what level a player is blogging about, so I will speculate this to be a self-selected trend. Perhaps it’s a bit much to ask an 18-year-old to write home and to hundreds of strangers every week. Then again, perhaps the Triple-A player is more confident of sticking around for awhile, saving a considerable amount of embarrassment from a blog ending suddenly due to being released mid-season.

Up next, the blog-by-blog stats. How many, how long, how popular. Are we having fun yet? . . .Your friend in baseball.

Entry Filed under: Major League Baseball,Minor Leagues,Rancho Cucamoga Quakes