The Red Sox have seven teams stocked with their prospects (Pawtucket, Portland, Salem, Greenville, Lowell, GCL Sox, DSL Sox).
This puts them on a level field with 13 other MLB franchises who also have seven minor league squads (ATL, CLE, COL, LAD, MIA, LAA, MIL, MIN, OAK, SDP, SFG, TEX, WAS). Surprisingly (to me, anyway), it also places them in the bottom half as far as the number of affiliates.
Ten franchises have eight minor league clubs (BAL, ARI, CHC, CIN, DET, HOU, KCR, PHI, STL, TOR). And there are five MLB teams with a whopping nine affiliates (NYM, NYY, PIT, SEA, TBR).
Then there's the lone outlier, the White Sox, who for some reason have just six (6) minor league teams.
I haven't looked, but I assume there's nothing in the MLB Constitution or rules that places any minimum or maximum limits on (a) the number of players you can have under minor league contracts, or (b) the number of affiliates you can stock them with.
For the franchises with 8 or 9 affiliates, the surpluses lie in countries whose citizens aren't yet subject to an MLB amateur draft. That makes perfect sense since the only real restriction at present seems to be the international bonus pool. Otherwise it's just find a shitload of players and sign 'em up before your competitors do. The 9-affiliate club members all have two teams in such countries. The Yankees, Mets & Pirates each have a pair of DSL teams, while the Mariners & Rays have one each in the DSL and VSL.
I guess having as many players as possible in your development chain is ostensibly supposed to increase your chances of developing MLB talent. So why are the Red Sox fielding two fewer minor league clubs than a pair of their division rivals? Why aren't they fielding a full team in Venezuela as well as the Dominican? Do they feel that it's better to follow the "smaller class size" model, whereby they have fewer (but more gifted) players, and then provide them with more individual attention and personalized instruction?
And what's the White Sox' logic behind having three fewer affiliates than 17% of their MLB competitors? While they do have a DSL team, they're the only franchise that doesn't have a rookie-level affiliate based at their spring training camp. The other 29 clubs all have such teams in Arizona or Florida.
It's all... screwy.
So, WTF?
This puts them on a level field with 13 other MLB franchises who also have seven minor league squads (ATL, CLE, COL, LAD, MIA, LAA, MIL, MIN, OAK, SDP, SFG, TEX, WAS). Surprisingly (to me, anyway), it also places them in the bottom half as far as the number of affiliates.
Ten franchises have eight minor league clubs (BAL, ARI, CHC, CIN, DET, HOU, KCR, PHI, STL, TOR). And there are five MLB teams with a whopping nine affiliates (NYM, NYY, PIT, SEA, TBR).
Then there's the lone outlier, the White Sox, who for some reason have just six (6) minor league teams.
I haven't looked, but I assume there's nothing in the MLB Constitution or rules that places any minimum or maximum limits on (a) the number of players you can have under minor league contracts, or (b) the number of affiliates you can stock them with.
For the franchises with 8 or 9 affiliates, the surpluses lie in countries whose citizens aren't yet subject to an MLB amateur draft. That makes perfect sense since the only real restriction at present seems to be the international bonus pool. Otherwise it's just find a shitload of players and sign 'em up before your competitors do. The 9-affiliate club members all have two teams in such countries. The Yankees, Mets & Pirates each have a pair of DSL teams, while the Mariners & Rays have one each in the DSL and VSL.
I guess having as many players as possible in your development chain is ostensibly supposed to increase your chances of developing MLB talent. So why are the Red Sox fielding two fewer minor league clubs than a pair of their division rivals? Why aren't they fielding a full team in Venezuela as well as the Dominican? Do they feel that it's better to follow the "smaller class size" model, whereby they have fewer (but more gifted) players, and then provide them with more individual attention and personalized instruction?
And what's the White Sox' logic behind having three fewer affiliates than 17% of their MLB competitors? While they do have a DSL team, they're the only franchise that doesn't have a rookie-level affiliate based at their spring training camp. The other 29 clubs all have such teams in Arizona or Florida.
It's all... screwy.
So, WTF?