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It’s Time To Prepare For a Post-Appalachian League Era
But not a post-baseball one in the Tri-Cities
On Wednesday, June 17 the Johnson City Press gave front page sports section priority to Greg Estes, a baseball fan who is trying to organize a letter writing campaign to save the Appalachian League.
One day later, his Facebook page, with eight members, has one person signed up to write letters.
It’s rather obvious the Appalachian League as we knew it, an affiliated rookie-level professional baseball league, is over. COVID-19 will cancel this season, and after the mass player release and limited five round baseball draft it’s difficult to see where the players would even come from if they wished to play.
Every team in the league except the Pulaski Yankees, who would move to the Class A South Atlantic League, is slated to be eliminated next season. And even if plans changed that would save some of the 42 pro baseball teams slated to be on the chopping block, it’s unlikely the Appalachian League, where the teams are owned by the major league organizations, would be one of them.
While the owner of an individual minor league team may be able to maneuver to save his investment, when the clubs are owned by the entity that wants to eliminate them its hard to see a plan that will save them.
