When the whole world began living on lockdown in mid-March of 2020, did you ever think that you would be able to attend a sporting event in-person that same summer? At the start of July, the only professional sports league in America playing was the PGA Tour. Even if a league, regardless of level, was playing, wouldn’t the reasonable assumption be that there were no fans allowed? Not exactly.
The American Association, the country’s premiere independent minor league baseball league is coming off a successful 2020 season and yes, a limited amount of fans were in the stands.
“Ultimately, we had fans in every location where we played. We followed protocols. We were guided by Major League Baseball in the inception of those protocols and I think we were reasonable in what we did. Because we took a conservative and reasonable approach, we were able to host those games with fans with zero transmission associated with our games,” said American Association commissioner Joshua Schaub about the league’s impressive feat.
The Milwaukee Milkmen took home the 2020 league championship over the Sioux Falls Canaries, a year in which six out of the league’s 12 teams participated in a 60-game season. In 2021, the Association will regain full strength at 12 members playing 100 games, just one of the many modifications that fans will see for the upcoming season. However, the league roster will not look the same as it did in 2019.
The beacon of the American Association, the St. Paul Saints, left independent baseball to become the Minnesota Twins Triple-A affiliate. The Texas Airhogs, based in Grand Prairie, Texas, ceased operations after sitting the 2020 season out.
“We clearly knew that if there were teams moving out of affiliated baseball, the Saints are the premiere minor league baseball team in the country. Why wouldn’t the Twins or any other big-league team want to affiliate with them? I can’t blame them for going to Triple-A; what a great story for us to tell at the American Association for a team from our league to move into Triple-A seamlessly,” said Schaub.
The two new teams plugging the gaps are the Kane County Cougars and the Houston Apollos, the latter being a league-created traveling team. Schaub anticipates the Apollos to lay down more permanent Houston roots in the future. The Kane County Cougars, who call Batavia, Illinois home, caught the short end of the stick as they were one of 40 Minor League teams that had their MLB affiliation severed after 2020. In order to maintain the league’s high- level of performance, Schaub reveals there are many requirements to join the Association.
“We have a very heavy vetting process. Any team that has come in during the last five years can attest to that, Cleburne, Milwaukee, Chicago and now Kane County. They still have to meet all of the criteria from ownership, stadium, and market to enter our league,” said the league’s commissioner.
With 12 teams battling for the upcoming season, many of their rosters have been completely revamped. Before the 2020 season, the American Association held a dispersal draft, where many of the league’s best players were up for grabs for one season, and one season only. Now, a majority of the players selected in the dispersal draft are being returned to their original teams or have latched on with different squads. Despite change as a common theme on league rosters, the competitive density looks to remain where it was in 2020.
“Those Double-A, Triple-A quality players will end up in our league. I in fact think that the elimination of those 40 [Minor League] teams will reap great rewards for our league in terms of quality of talent and will offset any lowering of the bar,” said Schaub. “Most would say that, depending who the starting pitcher is that night, that we do in fact play at a Triple-A level.”
However, the biggest positive shift for the American Association is the league’s rebranding: first, updating the league’s logo and secondly, announcing in September that it would become a partnership league with the MLB.
The results of the partnership between the two leagues will begin to take shape over the course of the near future, but seeing players shuttling between the MLB and the American Association may be more commonplace now.
“We have a skeleton agreement with them in terms of what type of initiatives we want to create over the next few years. But really what we see in this partnership in the future is some cross-marketing between Major League Baseball and the MLB partner leagues,” said Schaub.
Teams in the Association that are located near geographies of major league teams would get marketed by their nearest major league team and vice versa. For example, the Milwaukee Milkmen would cross-market with the MLB’s Brewers, and the Chicago Dogs would cross-market with the Cubs or White Sox.
In addition to the MLB, the American Association even established their reach overseas, as the league also partnered with the Australian Baseball League. According to Schaub, reaching out to the ABL and other international leagues would reap almost the same type of rewards as partnering with the MLB, but an advantage to connecting with foreign leagues is year-round content. In January 2021, the Association broadcasted 20 games from the ABL on their streaming website, aabaseball.tv. A select number of American Association games will in turn be broadcasted on the ABL’S streaming site.
Among the newer changes, the league recently announced partnerships with two innovative and cutting-edge technologies: Rebus and Rapsodo.
“Rebus is a widget that comes out from the side of your screen, whether it be on the team website, league website, and most importantly on aabaseball.tv and Facebook,”said Schaub about the one-of-a-kind technology. “Rebus just gives you instant access to our teams’ inventory of merchandise or experiences during the game.”
If a player hits a home run for example, the Rebus widget allows you to shop for the exact type of bat used, all while not having to leave the game’s stream. Other game-used merchandise, tickets, and fan experiences will also be available on Rebus.
On April 7, the league announced that they reached a deal with Rapsodo as their official technology partner. The player performance analytics technology is used by all 30 MLB teams, according to a league press release.
“This first-of-its-kind partnership is the American Association’s first foray into leaguewide data analytics capture and will be immensely helpful in providing benchmarks in player development and performance”, said the release from the American Association.
While the combined amount of new teams, rosters, and partnerships might be enough to make your head spin, commissioner Josh Schaub says that “The ball just keeps rolling on new initiatives that we’re creating within the league.” Schaub also hinted at the possibility of future league expansion as well.
Schaub, along with many others who follow minor league baseball, agree that the American Association is the best of independent minor league baseball in the nation.
“We’re the most innovative and pure baseball league in the country. It seems like a paradox that we would be implementing all this technology and yet still maintaining the purest form of baseball. We haven’t changed any rules, which you’re seeing from Major League Baseball, it’s still the game you grew up loving and we play to win. We’re not here to develop players, our players play for their local communities.”
The American Association will begin their season on May 18.