Professional sports’ coronavirus-forced shutdown could have an especially negative effect on minor league baseball players. Even in the best of times, their salaries pale in comparison to players in the majors. And now that play’s suspended for an indeterminate amount of time, minor leaguers can’t even receive unemployment benefits because they’re under contract with major league teams, attorney Garrett Broshuis points out on Twitter. Fortunately, though, multiple teams in the majors seem to be stepping up on behalf of players from lower leagues.
The Rangers are among the organizations that have mentioned the idea of paying minor leaguers to MLB during the game’s absence, Evan Grant of the Dallas Morning News tweets. It’s unclear which actions MLB will take in response, but this is no doubt a dire situation for minor leaguers, who haven’t collected salaries since last August. Athletics minor league pitcher Peter Bayer tweeted Thursday that he has begun driving for the food delivery service DoorDash in order to help make up for the wages he stands to lose with the sport on hiatus. He’s surely not the only minor leaguer scrambling to earn a living right now.
Even before the coronavirus wreaked havoc on the world, low minor league pay was a hot-button issue across baseball. As of 2018, the average minor league salary ranged from roughly $6K in Single-A ball to around $15K at the Triple-A level, Daniel Gallen of PennLive.com noted last June. Those salaries are close to the 2019 poverty line of $12,490, which doesn’t reflect well on pro baseball teams. As of last April, Forbes valued the average MLB franchise at $1.78 billion.
This is so sad. I already miss baseball. But what if you were a diehard baseball fan and you had a player knocking on your door with your food?
grab the food and say thank you, probably won’t know if they are a player or not
I’d ask Mike Trout to also tell me next week’s weather forecast and tip him an extra dollar or two.
Ask for an autograph and give them a tip, what i would do at least.
Pay the men
Those owners better step up. This is not when you leave people high and dry.
Hope my Jays step up and pay the kids
PAY THEM! I think they will step up plus they wont loose that much money from this in the long term.
Can the Astros $5MM cheating fine be allocated to help cover minor leaguers?
That’s honestly brilliant
Sadly, that will go towards Manfred’s salary instead
These kids should definitely be paid and they can easily increase the pay scale without cutting back on the number of teams and leagues. In Europe the super teams in soccer are destroying the lower leagues and hurting the sport. Baseball should learn from that and increAse support for the minor league players, teams and fans
I hope this doesn’t affect me when I’m playing in the minors next year
pay the kids already! if the kids have to go out and work menial jobs there is higher chance they get infected by corona 19!
Sports has always been the thing people can get together and escape the world. With that gone, what’s the answer? What’s the unifying element that we can all go to and forget about the problems we face? Idk…. some not very poetic, yet deep things to think about
I’m going to learn how to play video games so I can talk shit with random strangers from the comfort of my couch. It’s been a while as the last system I owned was the original Playstation. Like riding a bike, right?
Tony Hawk pro skater?
Amen to that. Baseball has always been America’s pastime and escape from the hardships and wars that raged in the past. To see it come to this is hard but necessary. Plus maybe the shortened schedule do the team some good in terms of wear and tear.
Don’t use the name Rudy Gobert from sports right now. Use names like Kevin love and Giannis Anteketounmpo yes they earn large salaries, but let’s focus on the small positives in this time of uncertainty. These guys doing community things Like paying the hourly wages for arena employees should be what all sports fans are talking about in this time of uncertainty. Pay the damn minor leaguers
gobert apologized, though.
can’t fix stupid
Gobert apologized for being patient zero in the NBA and literally touching everything in the room during his media session. But seriously though that is great of Love and Anteketounmpo and any other player who is helping out, hope more follow suit and pay it forward if you will.
MLB should pay the minor leaguers, it’s not like their salaries are going to break them and they would be paying them anyway if they were playing so why not?.
Correct, but I mean the first name to surface that has tested positive. Everywhere else will try to make there money by scaring the $hit out of us – let’s see what millionaires step up and help their community- no sports in 2020 it’s impossible to have them start up- let’s focus on the ones that are helping us out in a time on need – I want to see 200 or more athletes step up.
They are way over 200+ pro athletes already doing community work and changing lives before this current health crisis. It’s the media that chooses not to report it. Easy to search “pro athlete charity foundations” and see how you can also volunteer your time for local communities.
It doesn’t get much worse than being a door dash driver! Those guys make very VERY little money.
Several years ago, I was a Grubhub driver for about three days when I moved to a new city to familarize myself with it. I think I averaged $20/hr. before accounting for taxes, gas, and vehicle wear and tear. Depending on your vehicle, it’s still better than mininum wage working at your own pace with no boss. If you get into an accident, you’re on your own though.
Actually the cost of your car puts you in the negative.
Yes. In my case, I was exchanging vehicle depreciation for cash as mine was less than a year old then. I preferred it over aimlessly driving around to get to know my city. The gig only makes sense if you have an old beater with decent fuel mileage.
Do the right thing owners…pay them.
Most already have jobs during the off-season. But that doesn’t help a whole lot right now. Plus many quit to make ends meet with better jobs. This is a real problem for some though. Teams should be able to step up a little financially to figure this out. At least in the service you get fed, housed and clothed. It’s bare bones sure but it meets basic needs.
Pay the minor leaguers. It is the right thing to do.
This is what happens when your union only cares about the Harpers and Coles (and yes, I know minor leaguers aren’t part of the union, that only proves the point).
In the NHL, a sport with half the revenues of baseball, the stars make less but everyone else does much better.
The median salary is higher in hockey, almost $2 million vs. about $1.5 million in baseball, but again, the NHL has half the revenue. So, in terms of what % of the total sport’s revenue the players are making, hockey’s median salary is almost 3 times higher than baseball.
The minimum salary in the NHL is $650,000. Again, half the revenues, so that’s equivalent to $1.3 million in terms of % of revenue in baseball compared to hockey.
And the minimum salary for AHL players (hockey’s AAA) is $65,000. Compare that to $4/hr and a box of Pop Tarts that minor league ball players get for their effort.
For some reason, the NHLPA could work on behalf of minor leaguers. Odd, huh?
Ultimately, the union reflects the wishes of it’s membership. The NFL union looks like it’s about to agree to a deal that a lot of the star players don’t love, because it is going to put money in the pockets of a bunch of guys who aren’t likely to get paid anything beyond their initial rookie deal.
MLB PA has been driven for years that by focusing on the top of the market, it will pull everyone else up. If the numbers you give above are accurate (and I have no reason to disbelieve you) than that shows that they are incorrect.
I’d you’re looking to help, follow @adoptmilbplayer on Twitter and sign up to sponsor a player. It’s a pretty neat deal, although it shouldn’t exist because the players should be paid more.
They typically ask to spend $100-$150 a month on snacks, hygiene products, drinks, etc. to help the non bonus babies out during the season.
I currently sponsor a player and it’s been a very neat experience so far communicating with them and learning what they go through.
You forget, a lot of these kids have received bonus money, avg. Is around $50k… If you count that as salary, they are fine.
I guess most don’t remember as late as early 70’s, more then half of the MLB players needed jobs in the off seasons…
In a perfect world the billion dollar owners of the teams should do the right thing and pay the minor league players a living wage. As that seems unlikely, the Evan Longorias and Albert Pujols of the sport should take on the financial responsibility at least while the hiatus from coronavirus leaves them without job. However it is gonna be the voodoo chile pleases of world that actually do it. Bravo to you sir