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

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.

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

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.

Add comment June 21st, 2009

Link of the Week (or Whenever): Media Links

June 10, 2009 — Once your fave ballplayer makes it to The Show, it’s pretty easy to keep tabs on how he’s doing. As friends and family will tell you, though, trying to follow someone’s progress as he works his way through the minor league system can be a challenge.  Benjamin Hill notes the community of minor league baseball followers often can provide tidbits of info determined to be not-revenue-worthy by the mainstream media outlets.  Between the two sources, you can get some pretty decent coverage.

The tricky part is gleaning out the category of information you want. For example, some websites focus on trades and/or fantasy; others offer stats, trends and forecasts;  still others provide debate and discussion. So, in an effort to guide you through the maze, or perhaps just to sort them out for myself, I offer this short list, with a word of warning. Per usual, my choices might be on the eccentric side. Of course, you knew this already, yes?. . .Your friend in baseball.

The Show

Triple-A

Double-A

Advanced-A

Single-A

Rookie

Independent Leagues

A random assortment of stuff

A handful of blogs by players and their better halves

Facebook, Twitter, YouTube

Add comment June 10th, 2009

Lady’s Choice: Player Pick for April

May 10, 2009 — What a spring. Yesterday afternoon marked game #29. In that time, we’ve watched 22 different pitchers step onto the mound. Pitcher #22, Ervin Santana, was team transaction #44. Not long ago, the running tally for pitchers actually exceeded the total number of games played. Woof.

Still, despite our revolving-door roster in April, one name clearly stands out thus far. . .Chris Pettit. Yours truly must admit being a bit surprised. What I mean is, after following our Bees players during big league spring training, I expected to be writing about Brown, Figueroa, Rodriguez or Wood after the first month of the season.

So where has he been hiding, anyway? Well, part of his low profile was due to a rather painful 2008 season. After an impressive season with Cedar Rapids and Rancho Cucamonga in 2007, Pettit didn’t get much of a chance to play at the Double-A level. On Opening Day with the Travelers, he broke his foot and didn’t rejoin the team until the end of June. This photo, BTW, has to be the worst front-office, PR decision I’ve seen in, well, like forever. . .?

Coming back, Pettit found it harder than he expected to find his swing again. He kept at it, making the most of his playing time in the Arizona Fall League and by the end of the season was named to the 2008 All-Prospect Team. In February 2009, he was invited to the Rookie Career Development Program. Followed by an invite to big league camp this spring.

In fact, his rise in the farm system has been punctuated by awards:
05/08/2009 Angels’ Minor League Player for April
12/04/2008 AFL All-Prospect Team
11/18/2008 AFL Stenson Sportsmanship Award Finalist
11/10/2008 AFL Player of the Week
10/23/2008 AFL Rising Stars
08/08/2007 Angels’ Minor League Player for July
06/19/2007 MID Mid-Season All-Star
06/08/2007 Angels’ Minor League Player for May
08/31/2006 PIO Post-Season All-Star

As of yesterday Pettit was hitting .448 BA (1st in PCL), 96 AB (tied for 18th), 43 H (1st), 20 RBI (tied for 8th), 61 TB (6th), 1.121 OPS (4th). Last night in Portland, he pushed his hitting streak to 17 games with his last at-bat. During the streak, BTW, he’s kept up a .536 BA and multiple-hit games for all but five!

How did I not hear more about this prospect, sooner? Seems as though I’m not the only one, though, who’d been a little slow to take notice. At the beginning of the season, Salt Lake Bees broadcaster Steve Klauke was told Pettit is most highly regarded for his defense. It’s true he’s got wheels in the outfield. Yeah, but, . . .35 hits in 29 games. . .those are some crazy offensive numbers.

I already was looking forward watching our major-league infield this spring—Brown, 1B | Rodriguez, 2B | Wood, SS | Sandoval, 3B. Looks as though we’ve got a pretty hot outfield as well, with Brad Coon, Terry Evans and that new kid, . . .Chris Pettit. . .Your friend in baseball.

Add comment May 10th, 2009