The Tri-City ValleyCats are suing the Houston Astros and Major League Baseball arising out of this offseason’s contraction of minor-league baseball, reports Daniel Kaplan of the Athletic. They become the second affiliate known to pursue legal action against their former parent club and the league; the Staten Island Yankees did the same in December.
The ValleyCats are seeking at least $15MM in damages, Kaplan reports. The crux of the team’s claims is that they relied upon the now-expired affiliation agreement between Major League Baseball and Minor League Baseball in selling tickets and advertisement sponsorships, which lost value when the club lost its affiliation with Major League Baseball. The ValleyCats remain operational as a member of the MLB-partnered Frontier League but will no longer serve as a traditional minor-league affiliate.
Tri-City’s complaint (more of which is available in Kaplan’s full piece) harshly criticizes MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred. “MLB’s intimidation tactics, which it used to pit MiLB teams against each other for the ‘privilege’ of not having their businesses destroyed, has gone on for years but was most vividly demonstrated by a May 2020 email in which Commissioner Rob Manfred emailed the ValleyCats’ owner condolences on the passing of his father, and then in the very same email, issued a veiled threat that any public statement made about MLB’s contraction efforts would be ‘unwise,” the ValleyCats alleged.
Tri-City’s previous owner, Bill Gladstone, passed away due to complications from COVID-19 last spring, Kaplan notes, with Gladstone’s son Doug on the receiving end of the alleged correspondence from Manfred.
It wouldn’t be surprising to see more teams that lost their affiliation follow the (Staten Island) Yankees’ and ValleyCats’ lead in bringing suit against their former parent clubs and MLB. The minor-league restructuring resulted in 40 teams losing their affiliation with Major League Baseball.
i highly doubt this contraction breaches the affiliation deals they previously operated under.
Case dismissed then, I guess.
Well… You made a strong case. I’m sold
Apparently this comment board is 99% lawyers
I’m not a lawyer but I did stay at Holiday Inn Express
Shrugs
Very suspicious, that Manfred, very suspicious. I can’t wait until Theo takes over as commish.
You do realize that Manfred works for the owners, don’t you? Theo will have the same bosses……..and you expect something different?
Very few people seem to realize that. Most people seem to be under the impression that the job of the commissioner is to appease fans.
Baseball would be better off if the commissioner did seek the best interest of the customer more often. Today’s revenue can easily be tomorrows loss.
While employed by the owners, the job of the commissioner is to maintain and grow the health of the sport, which in turn helps the owners. In this regard, he has been an abysmal failure. Going to be interesting to see if/how many fans return when allowed back in ballparks.
With the MiLB agreement gone I don’t see how they can compel MLB to do business with them. Sucks to be in Tri-Valley’s position but still business is business and that includes dirty business.
i also have to imagine there was a reason for teams inviting certain affiliates back. clearly Tri-City wasnt one of the top 120.
They always led the league in attendance, great ballpark., maybe need an affiliate closer to NY
I live in the area and was both a corporate sponsor and a season ticket holder. I believe the only reason they lost their affiliation is there where cities closer to the Yankees, Mets, Red Sox and Blue Jays
Classless Manfraud.
Lifelong Yankee fan—what would you expect?
His approval rating has to be in the tank at this point.
If there’s gonna be a strike over anything right now, I feel it’s gonna be over the minor leagues.
who is striking? the MLBPA players not playing in the Minors or the ununionized MiLB players?
Nah. Those with the ability to strike would do so in looking out for themselvese, not to defend those looking to take their spot in near future.
The MLB union didnt strike when those lower level players were making 700 bucks a month during the season. Why now?
MLB players union doesn’t have anything to do with the MiLB players. It wouldn’t cause a strike at all.
Manfred is a terrible person, he’s bad for the game, and these minor league teams have a right to feel betrayed.
That said, I’m not sure there’s much legal recourse here. I’d imagine MLB has some strong lawyers and knew what they were doing beforehand.
Let’s go Valley Cats! Comrade Manfred shouldn’t be able to take full control of Minor League affiliation like this and just dump the teams that he doesn’t want. Costing many people their jobs and their livelihoods all from the push of a button for him. I don’t care if they are still in a league, this quote from the article sums it up: “The crux of the team’s claims is that they relied upon the now-expired affiliation agreement between Major League Baseball and Minor League Baseball in selling tickets and advertisement sponsorships, which lost value when the club lost its affiliation with Major League Baseball.”. Help us Theo Epstein, you’re our only hope.
Actually MLB has the right and total power to do it. They didnt reshape the minors until the previous contract had expired. In Theory they didnt have to keep any team and could’ve just come up with 120 new cities to serve as minor league affiliates. Without that contract, there is nothing legally binding that forced MLB to do business with anyone not of their choosing.
…there is nothing legally binding… That your uninformed opinion is aware of. Thanks but I will wait for the judge to decide.
And let me add this… it was quite simply horrible business for this team to base their business on an expiring contract. This is entirely on the team
And that is totally the defense MLB is going to take into court (and win) with. The principle of the situation is bad on MLB’s part, but like you said they had every right to do so.
How is it bad on MLB’s part? Because they didn’t keep a bunch of minor league teams they felt were unnecessary? Sometimes you need to think with your brain and not your feels…
1984 dude,
Ben Shapiro wannabes are still wannabes.
hope they all combine suits into a class action and beat down on manfraud!
Wow if Manfred really sent that email saying condolences and then threatening him in the same email. That’s a pretty low blow!! Like that’s just incredibly classless and cruel. Having said all that however… I’m not sure they, nor any other minor league team that’s lost their affiliation, really has any case whatsoever against their parent club or major league baseball. Like the whole situation sucks all the way around. And moreso personally I’m sad that any team lost its affiliation. I guess it sounds like maybe it had to be done but idk personally I think the more minor league affiliates, the more opportunities and who knows every now and then some obscure minor league undrafted free agent makes it to the majors and maybe now that guy won’t get the chance. I realize it’s a LONGSHOT… BUT it does happen and idk just seems sad to see baseball leave any city let alone those who are so upset by it they’re fighting the decision. Just seems like if there’s that amount of passion there… that something could have been done. Maybe in the long run though… it will allow more “independent leagues” to pop up and get more legitimacy to ultimately fill the void left in those cities. I hope so anyway… because any city that wants competitive baseball badly enough to fight for it will hopefully be able to get it! That would just be good all around for the game of baseball.
Baseball didn’t leave the city. They’re still in the Frontier League… Daniel Nava style stories can still happen, but yes… without being part of MiLB: the organization is likely to draw less fans and thus earn less money.
Yeah I realize that… I mean i didn’t know the specifics of this teams new affiliation being with the Frontier League but I knew that the majority of previously affiliated clubs have found new teams/leagues to play there in the coming years. But also as you said having it no longer be an affiliate of a major league team is going to seriously hamper the clubs ability to generate revenue. They’ll no longer have the luxury of potentially being the home of new draft picks or even the occasional major leaguer on a rehab stint. Hopefully for the sake of the team and city… fans rally around the club regardless of the affiliation or not BUT it will just be that much harder for the club to generate enough revenue. Also I’m not entirely sure that ALL prior affiliated organizations have indeed found a new team to take their place. For example I think the Lowell Spinners (formerly the Red Sox A affiliate) might currently be completely without a new team to take its place. Fortunately for me I actually live in the City where the new Sox AAA team will be playing (Worcester) but i feel bad for the people of Lowell or for years have supported and embraced the Spinners. I hope for their and the cities sake a new team makes Lowell its home… or as the Red Sox have claimed… they may still work to bring back affiliated ball to the city. I understand the realities of the situation and that it may have been inevitable… but it’s still a sucky situation for the effected clubs and their respective cities.
Daniel Nava stories only happen in retrospect. He wasn’t a future MLB player at the time. Players like Mike Trout have kept attendance up in places like Clinton and Burlington in the Midwest League. But being around both in the past….those facilities dont even match decent college facilities now.
Time will tell what kind of impact this has on marketing the game. Baseball is baseball…but it’s a huge step down from Low A ball to second tier collegiate summer league. Perhaps the games themselves will matter to local communities without it just being about player development.
What’s going to improve are the collegiate summer leagues. College baseball is about to explode.
Line breaks
Thank you!
Jeff, you do post well thought out and articulated comments, but line breaks are of great need to you. Your comments tend to look like run-on sentences whenever you post – what should be – 4 paragraphs, as one.
You consistently make awful posts. You should focus on the poor quality of your own content.
Note that the plaintiff’s lawyers allege there was a veiled threat in the email and we are not told the actual words or context. I am not going to conclude there was threat made based on that.
yeah, trying to bring new young fans into the game? yeah, right!
that ship sailed with free agency and an unlevel financial playing field.
I pray this works, somehow. I’d love to get these teams back in affiliated ball, and get Manfred OUT.
How about instead of reducing the number of employers in order to pay MiLB players a better salary, you just open up the fat wallets you love sitting on so much?
to be fair, while it does decrease jobs, it benefits players who dont lose them quite a bit. they make more in the Minors and probably have a quicker path to the Majors. helps MLB teams have to pay less to operate MiLB affiliates while they force themselves to not unintentionally slow down prospects.
Why don’t you finance them?
1984 dude,
Your sociopathy is showing. Empathy. Learn some. Grow some. Or stay away from people. Thanks.
Ok, Karen. Looks like 1984 is living rent free in that head of yours.
Impressive, so many tropes and cliches packed into two brief sentences.
Unfortunately Tri City will have to accept Rubber Maid stock for compensation.
Seems like the Astros cheated the Tri-City Valley Cats of an affiliation. Astros fan here but I had to.
Astros should change their name to Cheaters
So does your wife.
MLB is wrong in the grand sense, but as much as I can’t stand Manfred and the league these days, unfortunately that doesn’t automatically mean they did anything illegal. Covid struck at a perfect time for MLB to pull this off, too. It doesn’t look to me like there’s a ton of legal merit here, but there’s a lot of minor league teams that can take a crack at this. It might not get anywhere by itself, but sometimes the reasoning used to dismiss the case, or facts MLB gets forced to reveal along the way, can help other MiLB clubs make a better case. I’d love to see MLB somehow find a way to get burned in all of this.
I agree… other than hurt feelings and an overall just ‘lousyness’ to the whole situation… I don’t actually think that the MLB or the major league clubs did anything that was actually ‘illegal’ — however having said that if the minor league teams have the patience and financial ability to drag these cases out longer and longer… it could wind up resulting in the MLB giving in at least in some cases and saying the ongoing legal fights just aren’t worth the time and money… and maybe just maybe something good comes out of it for the effected clubs and their cities. However given that I imagine MLB has far superior resources and lawyers… they might just be able to quash these cases before they even get off the ground. Or who knows maybe they wind up settling for some undisclosed amount just to be done with it. If that’s the case here’s to hoping it’s at least enough $ to actually make an impact and allow said clubs to find a way to make it on their own. Without the MLB affiliation… though in all likelihood if a settlement were reached. My guess is the owners of those former minor league clubs might just keep the $ for themselves. And who could blame them? They went from having an (at least somewhat) profitable and marketable product to having to settle for hosting an independent league club. Probably not exactly what they feel they signed up for.
My perfect scenario… I’d just like to see MLB stick its neck out too far defeating one of these cases, being absolutely legally correct, only to have their own argumentation wadded up and thrown back in Manfred’s face… used against them to wipe out the antitrust exemption. That would be beautiful.
I’m not really following what’s going on but on a side note, I really would love to see the minor leagues minimized a bit. A straight three A, AA, AAA type thing where we don’t have such insane amounts of resources going toward all these different leagues. Prep draftees go to A. College standouts go to AA. So on. But rookie ball and two (or maybe it’s three?) A ball leagues for players who won’t make money while living in some 2 bed, 10 roommates thing because they can’t be allocated money is just silly.
Contraction really does have to strengthen college ball… which, while is something I don’t pay much attention to… maybe it will become more interesting now? Maybe more players will go to college (educations of arguable merit) or stay there longer? If you think about how much money college football makes for universities and their surrounding businesses; perhaps even a 10% boost in college baseball game attendance because of a better/less diluted product? … I’m no economist… but how much money were low level MiLB teams even making?
Some of them a lot more than you think. Owning a MiLB team has become big business and usually the owners already have made a pile of money in other areas of life and it’s more or less a status symbol like a luxury care for those who are filthy rich but not quite billionaire filthy rich. In other cases it’s ownership groups that may own a half dozen MiLB and minor hockey teams.
Problem with that logic is there are only 11.7 scholarships per team in yet NCAA to field a squad of 26-30, so the best prep players get maybe a 50% scholarship. You will not see the college system benefit, you will see more kids late in the draft end up going internationally and playing in Australia, Korea, Japan, or even Mexico. Look at a school like Cal, who is a power 5 major program in California folded the baseball team until former players donated enough $$$ to fund the program for 2 years. College baseball is in the worst spot of any major sport in the NCAA.
True. College baseball tanks money every season. The only sport that is actually profitable in college is football and very select basketball programs. Football has to make boockoo bucks so that schools can afford to have other sports.
Also, I don’t think having kids go to college instead of playing minor league ball is better for the kid. At least he was getting paid something in the minors. A 19 year old blows out his arm in college and never makes a dime for 15 years of hard work. For those of you who give the “gEt An EdUcaTiOn” argument… you can always go back to school. People do it all the time. You cant go back to pro ball.
Agree it’s way too many players. With all the tools scouting departments now have, they know who has the ability to make it to the show. Keeping the hope alive for kids without that ability is a waste of everyone’s time.
I really feel bad for the owners of these teams, but this contraction was long overdue for a sport that spends way too much money trying to develop players who never even have a chance to make it to the majors. I’m surprised that MLB just didn’t leave the 30 AAA and AA teams intact and ‘cull’ teams from A+, A and short season A ball. In most cases, AAA & AA stadiums are bigger, nicer and have more player amenities than the lower level facilities (better medical facilities, training equip, etc), so it would have made sense to leave them as is, but there were a few that made sense when MLB was able to move a AAA club that was cross country to within less than an hour from the parent’s MLB park by replacing it with an existing A ball or AA ball franchise.
Of the 4 major professional sports, baseball requires the largest annual investment for teams to develop their prospects and its not even close. Between the International Free Agency Signing Period (which opened today) and the regular Rule 4 Amateur draft (June or July), teams are ‘forced’ to shell out $12M – $14M+ each year on lottery tickets where far less than 15% of them even make it up to the majors and a much lower percentage than that make it to the majors and make a difference.
After the draft & IFA, each MLB has to fund 8-9 minor league teams (prior to contraction). In addition to player salaries, benefits and team travel costs, for the MiLB teams owned by the parent club, they need to maintain each ballpark and pay all the costs associated with that (security, landscaping, ballpark upkeep and improvements, real estate taxes). They need to pay all of the non-player employees too including: ballpark staff, the teams’ coaching staffs, minor league executives, not to mention all of the scouts too. The total cost of player development in baseball has to cost at least 5X of the next closest professional sport: NHL hockey (AHL) or NBA (G-League) and probably has the worst rate of return (# of players who make it to the parent club) out of all 3 of them.
So much money goes into these minor league teams and player development, yet the return on investment is quite minimal. As of 2019, I believe they said less than 10% of minor league players ever make it to the majors at all. So while I hate to see these local, fun minor league teams with devoted fanbases get tossed away like garbage (or get recycled to the Frontier League), this was long overdue for MLB and an argument can be made that even more contraction is needed. Draft fewer players and have fewer teams. The truly best prospects will remain and the lesser ones can move to Independent ball. The talent level in Independent Baseball will go up too and will also be used as ‘farm system’ for MLBs farm system. With that said, Rob Manfred handled this thing so poorly and so crassly that I hope a few of these teams win their lawsuits and the owners finally see how incompetent he is at his job. Now batting for the Commissioner’s Office: Theo Epstein, the Savior of Baseball.
tl;dr
you guys and your man crushes on Theo Epstein are comical. The issues with baseball will not be resolved until the money starts drying up, on both sides. it will happen but its not in our life times. Theo has no jedi mind tricks to save it. Hell he couldn’t even draft a pitcher in Chicago….
Most teams had 7 affiliates. There were some exceptions, such as the Yankees, but 7 was more common (5 A-leagues, 1 rookie stateside league, and 1 foreign rookie league).
As far as operating expenses go, you might be surprised how MLB compares. Each sport operates under a different process and has different responsibilities; different ways of investing in their respective sports. Here’s the NFL’s and MLB’s reported operating incomes from 2019…
statista.com/statistics/193556/operating-income-of…
statista.com/statistics/193650/operating-income-of…
Yes, the addresses say 2010, but they simply recycled them. The numbers are updated for 2019.. Obviously you have to consider gross income, which the NFL has an advantage, but MLB is hardly a victim of revenue/spending and that’s the point. MLB seemingly spends more on their development, but the NFL invests more on other programs and spends more at the top.
MLB, as you’re aware, is struggling to attract and retain interest. Attendance has declined 4 years in a row (not counting 2020). The average salary hasn’t increased in 5 years. Is contraction going to help with that? Are owners going to pocket any initial savings? Dropping attendance figures are arguably a consequence of lower spending (generally speaking), but perhaps attendance will get a boost with a lower bar to clear for the postseason. Regardless, none of it will likely make baseball more appealing to young athletes over the long-term. Maybe owners don’t care as long as they don’t see it as a threat to the franchise value when it comes time to sell?
MLB expansion could help. That would revive a dozen teams (including rookie teams). Expanding active rosters to 27 could help. But ultimately, better management and regulation are needed. A new commissioner would be great. Better representation for the Players’ Union would be good.
Baseball needs help. Contraction doesn’t look like the answer. I’m not convinced there’s a simple solution, but let’s see what the new CBA brings.
Lawyer Manfred and the Harvard gang are squeezing every penny of short term profit out of MLB for ownership but they are destroying the game for generations to come. in the process. Fandom is generational. They’re pricing so many people out of enjoying the experience. This isn’t how you grow a sport. It’s how you kill one. Enjoy your billion dollar money printing schemes while they last.
The players greed is playing a huge hand in this too. kids don’t buy jerseys because their favorite players need for the money.
Cheaters. Good. Who cares what happens to this wretched cheating pile of scum
Cut. It. Out.
Why would the Astros have a minor league team all the way in upstate NY. Doesn’t make much sense.
Reach. One of the mission statements of milb has always been to serve markets that don’t directly have mlb teams. The Yankees can’t just have a monopoly and put minor league teams in the entirety of New York in every market… they don’t have enough teams to do so.
From the day they first talked contraction and they listed all the cities and teams that would be affected, Tri-City was never on that list.. Losing affiliation was not in the plans at all, they were not prepared. Tri-City always drew well, and lucky for them, they won a lot. There was something personal and vindictive about them losing affiliation. That being said, I hated the NY-Penn League. This is a league made up of 1st year out of college players and the lack of attention to the fundamentals of baseball was glaring. When there was a franchise in Albany (one of the Tri-citys) we had season tickets for all 20 years they had a team and probably missed but 50 games over those 3 reins of A’s affiliation, Yankees affiliation, and Independent League baseball.. Now, the Valleycats were literally in my backyard. On my deck we stood for the National Anthem, and if we chose to, could fill a line-up card from the announcements, we were that close. On the advice of a friend, we waited to see this brand of baseball before committing to season seats. With my love of the game, the close proximity of the stadium (500-600 yards of woods between the ballpark and me) you would have thought I was all in, but if I got to 25 games over the 17 years I lived right there. Just awful fundamental baseball at AAA prices for tickets and concessions. Since they opened I was in Yankee Stadium, 150 miles away, more often than in a Valleycats seat. Just because you wear a uniform, doesn’t make you a professional baseball player and people should not be made to think that they are watching professionals play, when they are 90% college players and high round draftees. The difference between the AA baseball I grew to love in Albany and the NY-Penn style of baseball is as glaring as day and night, salt and sugar..
I don’t know what you mean by AAA prices. The best seats in the stadium (next to the top step of the dugout by the net) was $10.50, free parking, a draft beer with hotdog was like 5 bucks. Themed nights which seemed like 75 percent of the time along with after game fireworks.
Also, Valleycat alum include: Jose Altuve, George Springer, Dallas Keuchel, Joe Musgrove, Ben Zobrist, Hunter Pence. They all seemed to do okay for themselves.
@banner19 well obviously, if you aren’t Derek Jeter in his prime within a month of being drafted, you obviously aren’t worthy of stepping foot on a baseball field in front of a fan. /s
The fundamentals take years of baseball to learn. The reason you don’t see them is because most players that are drafted, are athletes not baseball players. give scouts a fast guy with a strong arm and he gets drafted to play center field. baseball players are not drafted anymore, athletes are.
Classless Manfred. Sends condolences on the passing of the former owner then worms in a mob-like threat basically saying “keep your mouth shut”. Manfred is more mob boss than commissioner.
You are simply taking the plaintiff’s lawyers word that there was a veiled threat, without the actual words or context and concluding there was a mob-like threat made. Reasonable.
Wow, you certainly seem to have a lot of inside knowledge on this subject. Did they copy you on the emails?
Spent the last 20 years going to multiple valley cats games every summer. I hope they get the affiliation back. Highly doubtful but no affiliate baseball here will suck
Tri City placed 69th in average attendance in 2019. Pretty good for an A-ball team.
Allowing two expansion teams could have helped alleviate some of the problem.
Anybody else read the first two lines of the story and get bored?
Follow the money, it was a financial move and the MLB clubs made the decision, the commissioner delivered it.
cost of players go up, orgs have less money to throw around. makes sense to me, sad as it is.
Wiffle bats. That is all.
Im not sure why most of the comments section is taking the side of MLB and saying they can contract teams as they want. Contracts go both ways. Tri City’s affiliation contract was up anyway, yes, but not all of the teams losing affiliation were without contract (see round rock express). MLB definitely needs to face the consequences of suddenly uprooting so many cities
The master agreement had lapsed so there is no cause of action against MLB, sadly. If an MiLB team had a contract with the parent club, it might have a case against that club, depending on the terms of their contract.
As far as I’m concerned, Manfraud needs to go and can go to Hell after he is dead.
+1
Commissioners before Selig and Manfred combined business sense and true love for the game. Manfred displays neither, and there will be consequences. For example, MiLB owners will be far less likely to invest in facilities improvements without a longer affiliation agreement. Perhaps this was taken for granted before, but not now. A businessman would look ahead and anticipate this. A shark lawyer just looks to prevail.
Why is everyone only blaming Manfred? It’s not like he is doing anything unilaterally. He works for the owners. You don’t here owners screaming about this, do you? Manfred is doing what the owners want him to do…..smh….
…and he does it gladly.
I live near Troy NY where the valley cats are located. I loved going to games there. The entire Tri-valley organization was a class act and the ballpark is beautiful and the crowds plentiful. A number of star players have passed through Troy including a good share of the Champion Astros. Shameful on behalf of mlb to make promises only to pull the rug out on them.
Thank you, Contract Law practitioners and fellow judges. We can now rule on the merits or lack thereof in the instant case.
I need to brush up on the details of the mlb/milb agreement but the MLB affiliates of the minor league teams being cut I’m sure don’t want them gone. MLB wants complete control and Mandred is way too political as commissioner and should t be there.
When you give an owner a choice between wins in the mlb (free agent – arbitration – salaries hikes) vs keeping a minor league team, the answer is obvious. Players salaries have a big part of this.
The only way the Joe Bruno Stadium in Troy stays alive is for the Yankees or Mets to move a farm team there. Its time for Rensselaer County Executive Steve McLaughlin to get on the phone
I wish it was more teams i don’t think the mlb was wrong by changing things but they should’ve taken care of their affiliates on the way out.