Amid changes, Chiefs players to get pay hike, housing

The absence or presence of justice can be found almost everywhere, from homeless shelters to legislatures to baseball diamonds.

Baseball is probably far from your mind unless you’re a fan of Atlanta (whose World Series star was ex-Peoria Chiefs outfielder Jorge Soler) or you dread a likely Major League Baseball work stoppage. Chiefs players are gone but General Manager Jason Mott is mindful of MLB’s labor talks, plus changes in wages and working conditions in the Minor Leagues, as he prepares for 2022 and another step back from the pandemic.

“This will be the second year we try to get bask to ‘normal’,” he says. “Like everywhere else, it hasn’t been easy.”

Besides COVID, which cancelled the minors’ 2020 season and hurt 2021, Minor League baseball is facing reforms players and their advocates see as overdue, and other changes that could make Designated Hitters and artificial turf seem quaint.

On the plus side, MLB in February announced it’s requiring in-season housing to be provided for minor leaguers starting this year, and increased wages. A more neutral alteration was improving facilities and realigning the minors through a Professional Development League plan that eliminated franchises including Iowa’s Burlington Bees and Clinton Lumberkings. On the downside (for traditionalists anyway) is baseball trying an Automated Balls & Strikes system (“robot umpires”) to be used experimentally in the Atlantic League.

“The players certainly deserve a raise and housing – whatever help they can get,” says Mike Olson, a longtime Peoria coach and former associate scout for the Mariners active with the storied Central Illinois Collegiate League for years.

“Back in the CICL, for amateurs, they paid their own expenses,” he continues. “Sometimes guys would live in rooms on Bradley’s campus. When future Hall of Famer Mike Schmidt played here in 1969, he stayed at the Holiday Inn in East Peoria.

“As for teams’ facilities, I don’t see how the minors can make it,” he adds. “Some teams may need to invest millions to make those improvements in Major-League-style clubhouses, batting cages and so on.”

Mott says MLB will underwrite the housing, whether through arranged lodging or player stipends.

“What we’ll lose is our host families,” he says. “They’re local homes that offer spare bedrooms so players can save on rent, and the players are mostly gone, but they like having that connection, and the families do, too.”

In the 1950s, about 10,000 ballplayers were in hundreds of teams in dozens of states. Now, some 4,000 ballplayers play on 120 clubs in 11 MLB-affiliated leagues under the 10-year agreement with MLB announced in February. The Chiefs – a Limited Liability Corporation with 48 shareholders, including well-known locals such as David Bielfeldt, Michael Cullinan and Don Fites – are in Class High-A’s Central League, with 12 teams in two divisions. Peoria’s in the West Division, with teams from Appleton and Beloit, Wis., Cedar Rapids and Davenport, Iowa, and South Bend. Ind.

The reforms probably stem from criticism from players and supporters about the wages, hours and working conditions young athletes in the minors endured.

Former minor-leaguer Harry Marino, director of Advocates of Minor Leaguers, told ESPN. “This is a historic victory for minor-league baseball players. When we started talking to players this season about the difficulties they face, finding and paying for in-season housing was at the top.”

MLB sets minor-league pay, which has been between $12,000 and $16,800 a season (for perspective, the federal poverty level for an individual is $12,880. Outrage resulted in 2018, when in a 2,232-page $1.3 trillion spending bill, minor-league players were excluded from the minimum wage, overtime and other protections in the Fair Labor Standards Act. Inserted on page 1,967 from an original bill titled “Save America’s Pastime Act” (critics said the title was “flagrantly inappropriate” and asked if the pastime was “screwing workers”).

That clarified/legalized past practice (and killed pending lawsuits), but MLB heard the complaints and raised wages 38% to 72%. Rookies will go from $290 to $400/week; A-ball from $290 to $500; AA from $350 to $600; and AAA from $502 to $700.

Working conditions aren’t as simple as playing games. Minor leaguers have bills; some have families; and duties before and after games, plus ongoing conditioning and travel time, totaling far more than 40-hour work weeks.

“Players are faster, stronger and bigger,” Mott says. “They eat better, work out more, and know analytics, unlike just a few years ago.

“The Professional Development League structure helps ensure quality,” he continues, “making sure the facilities are high-caliber and the [geographic] alignment makes sense. We’re set to stay where we’re going to be. The Cardinals’ clubs are located well, with [Triple-A] Memphis, [Double-A] Springfield, Mo., and us all pretty close.”

Finalizing his staff, Mott – a 43-year-old Missouri native who’s been in baseball for 12 years and is entering his eighth season with the Chiefs – also is planning for promotions and marketing.

“People’s time is valuable, so we want to give them reasons to come, from fireworks to giveaways,” he says.

Professional baseball is entertainment, part of what makes towns “liveable,” along with theaters, museums, and other attractions. Also, unlike some workers, minor leaguers have chances to interact with the public.

“Guys buy into that,” Mott says. “We had a back-up player who was having a hard time talking with a fan before a game, not knowing their child was hearing-impaired. When he realized it, he made the effort and really made a connection. The family came back a lot, and their kid threw out the first pitch once, and because of the deafness couldn’t hear cheers, so we had the crowd raise and wave their arms. That was really heartwarming.”

A family of four on average pays $253 to attend a Major League game (counting parking, concessions and two ballcaps), according to the 2021 Team Marketing Report produced by Fan Cost Index. But at Dozer Park, where capacity is about 7,000, tickets cost $10-$16. Attendance over the 58 home games in last year’s five-month schedule “hadn’t quite recovered from the pandemic,” Mott says, adding that the team still drew more than 70,000.

An owners lockout or players strike seems imminent since the previous Collective Bargaining Agreement was scheduled to expire Dec. 1 with unsettled issues (bringing to mind a comment MLB Players Association director Marvin Miller said: “Money is not the issue. The real issue is the owners’ attempt to punish the players for having the audacity not to settle and for having the audacity not to crawl”).

But the Minors will play if MLB and players don’t.

Minor leaguers aren’t unionized, but work at moving up. Some have.

Just as the CICL had Schmidt, plus future big leaguers ranging from Peoria’s Joe Girardi to Kirby Puckett and Joe Niekro, a list of ex-Chiefs is impressive: Jack Flaherty, Yadier Molina and Albert Pujols; Javier Baez, Mark Grace and Greg Maddux,

Mott says he can feel like a parent or teacher seeing players succeed.

“It’s pretty cool,” he says. “On the business side, we want them to make it; it’s great to have that to tout. But it’s always awesome. And sometime surprising. [Outfielder] Lars Nootbaer struggled here [in 2019], but he improved and made his St. Louis debut this season.”

Next season’s home opener is Tuesday, April 12 against the Dodgers-affiliated Great Lakes Loons, hopefully with happier prospects.

And no robots umpiring.