And I screwed up the tags. Everyone will receive a full refund.

Thanks Obama.

I thought we only cared that fewer black players were making the majors. Now we have to care about Puerto Ricans as well? I await the day when the MLB Network hires an ethnologist to help keep track of all of this.

Don't see how this can hurt.

Agree with #4. This may not be the perfect solution but it's a hell of a lot better than holding the status quo.

Plus, more baseball.

MLB Network needs programming.

Dental Plan!

MLB Network needs programming.

Dental Plan!

Players from Puerto Rico are subject to the Major League draft, which, kills the incentive for teams and scouts to go there and develop teenage talent like they do in the Dominican Republic or Venezuela.

Teams don't develop (amateur) teenage talent in the D.R. or Venezuela, either. They develop players after they've been signed, just like teams do with players from anywhere else.

At the same time, there is not enough wealth in Puerto Rico to support the sort of talent development which now rules in the United States and Canada (i.e. expensive youth leagues).

There's far more wealth in P.R. than there is in the D.R. or Venezuela, but somehow thousands of kids in those countries find their way to baseball fields (or parking lots, or streets) and play. The author, like the guy here from The Economist, seems to have reversed the cause and effect. Fewer kids are playing baseball in Puerto Rico because it's relatively wealthy, not because of a lack of wealth.

Also, Puerto Rico is only 100 miles by 35 miles. How expensive could an "expensive youth league" be on an island where one would never have to stay overnight in a hotel?

Major League Baseball has been working on this problem for a while now. Chucking the draft there would help solve it, of course,

No, it wouldn't.

but that’s not happening because MLB loves the draft.

And also because treating Puerto Ricans differently than it treats other U.S. citizens would all but invite a legal challenge.

Will this be a minor league or would it be with all unaffileated teams?

Also, Puerto Rico is only 100 miles by 35 miles. How expensive could an "expensive youth league" be on an island where one would never have to stay overnight in a hotel?

It can be a very long drive from say, San Juan to Guayamo. Roads aren't exactly interstates, and no other means of getting around (well, you could fly. Or sail).

It can be a very long drive from say, San Juan to Guayamo. Roads aren't exactly interstates, and no other means of getting around (well, you could fly. Or sail).

If the worst case is an occasional 3-hour car trip, then Puerto Rican baseball players are in great shape.

Bring back the Inter-American_League!

Teams don't develop (amateur) teenage talent in the D.R. or Venezuela, either. They develop players after they've been signed, just like teams do with players from anywhere else.

isn't the problem that PR players lose 2 years of development because they have to wait until they're 18 to be drafted instead of getting signed as free agents at 16?

isn't the problem that PR players lose 2 years of development because they have to wait until they're 18 to be drafted instead of getting signed as free agents at 16?

That's what some in P.R. claim, but if it was as simple as that, amateur leagues and academies would have sprouted up like they have in the D.R., Venezuela, and elsewhere, where dozens of non-MLB-affiliated people run such leagues and facilities for profit.

***

Bring back the Inter-American_League!

Interesting; I had never heard of this league. The logistics and travel expenses had to be massive. Quite an undertaking, at least for 1979.