I got up and looked at the standings of the Appalachian League today.

Fifteen games into the season the Elizabethton Twins are 14-1 and nobody else has a winning record in their division comprised entirely of Tri-Cities teams.

And even the Twins brass revealed in Trey Williams' column today about their hot start that their winning streak is as much the cause of other teams' ineptitude as their own quality play.

But is it a surprise? The Johnson City Cardinals have not won a League title in 31 years. The Bristol White Sox were competitive a few years ago, but not now. Same with the Greeneville Astros.

It is my belief that the Cardinals, White Sox, Mets, and Astros simply don't give the local Appy League teams quality talent.

The Twins stock Elizabethton with Joe Mauer. Who was the last real star to come from Johnson City- Terry Pendleton? Jack Wilson maybe?

Is Jack Wilson- the shortstop for the Pittsburgh Pirates- really a star?

The last star from Kingsport was- who- Darryl Strawberry?

When major league organizations avoid putting their top prospects in the Appalachian League it makes me think they are probably not taking the league seriously.

And if they're not taking the league seriously, they may not want to keep the league going in the future.

So the future of pro baseball in the area, and certainly any hope of a Johnson City team winning a championship, may lie in building a new stadium that will attract a Class A or AA franchise as well as house ETSU baseball.

Thoughts?

Yeah I think this is they way it should go. I would be much more likely to come out and watch AA baseball than the Appy Leauge...unless Rick Ankiel comes back to the Cardinals!

I believe David Wright and Jose reyes played in Kingsport a few years ago. Reyes is a marginal star (al a Jack Wilson) but Wright is the man in New York.

So that's why we should disdain a AA franchise?

Reyes is a star, so is Wright. The troubled Lastings Millege also played in Kingsport. So Kingsport gets talent but it normally doesn't stay long. That's the trouble with rookie ball. If a player is sent here they normally aren't super talented or they need to work on something specific. Most of the high draft picks go to A ball from the get go. Also if you show any signs of being a player you are quickly moved up the ladder.

The Kingsport Mets got a 2nd rounder this year but it was only because the kid was drafted as a project and needed to work into becoming a starter from being a closer. As soon as he figures it out he will move up.

Rookie ball is just not meant to be quality baseball, which is unfortunate.

Point is, the Mets could get this if they ran the club out of their spring training league in the Gulf Coast League.

Rookie ball may not be quality in Kingsport — it sure is in Elizabethton.

Look for instance through the Minnesota Twins line-up and their minor league affiliates, the rosters are stocked with Twins.

The three most promising pitchers in the Twins organization: Kevin Slowey, Matt Garza and Glen Perkins were all caught by former Buc Caleb Moore two years ago in Elizabethton. Guys like Denard Span will be household names in a couple of years. Then, you have Mauer and Morneau.

Minnesota has six Minor League teams and Elizabethton is second from the bottom. But the Twins scouts are excellent and the players they send to 'Betsy are awesome.

Like tonight, a guy who hasn't been much of a standout - Delbinson Romero - smacks three homers against Greeneville. They have last year's Dominican Summer League MVP Rene Leveret who is just tough. They have the tallest player in pro baseball in the 7-foot-1 Loek Van Mil. The Twins organization is there.

And I can say the same things about the Braves in Danville. So many talented players in the Atlanta organization have came through there.

Johnson City has had its share of first rounders over the last six years. The problem is, St. Louis' scouting sucks and most of those guys haven't amounted to much.

I may not speak for everyone else in this area, but for minor league baseball in this town, leave it like it is. We love it. Elizabethton is the only team in pro baseball to have a winning record since 1989 and is the winningest team (percentage wise) in pro baseball in that time frame so it's not like their dominance happened over night.

So the Appalachian League should stay around because the Twins win?

Johnson City should resign itself to perpetual whipping boy status so Elizabethton can have a good team?

The reason for the Twins success is because they have two teams beneath them. Ray Smith even commented the competition they get isn't very good.

Compare this to the Mets, who begin their farm system with Kingsport as the lowest rung on their chain.

Hmmmm. Sounds a little like ETSU, doesn't it?

Still, Elizabethton is given such lackluster attention by their own organization the Twins don't send promising young skippers there- they have Ray Smith and Jeff Reed treat it like a summer job.

What I'm saying is I open the paper and you can't get a game story or even a full box score of the Cardinals in the Press. Appy League teams have no press people, no marketing, very little or no radio, no anything. You have City Parks and Rec departments running the teams.

The Elizabethton Twins get so much attention for their town it is commonly misspelled "Elizabethtown." The website http://www.minorleaguenews.com spells the league "Appie."

You're telling me there is a significant future in a league that draws fewer fans than any other in baseball (save for the non-fan leagues that are run out of minor league complexes), doesn't command any respect locally, and the parent clubs themselves treat with disdain?

A league that doesn't even require all its fields be flat?

Here are the cities the Tri-Cities could be paired with if a Southern League team came with a new ETSU stadium-

Jacksonville

Birmingham

Knoxville

Chattanooga

Raleigh

Here's what we have now-

Princeton

Bluefield

Danville

Elizabethton

Greeneville

Why does this area settle for hamburger when they could have steak?

Im not sure JC is big enought to get a AA team. I think getting an A team would be a better possibility.

If Jackson, Tennessee can have a AA team, we can have a AA team.

The local inferiority complex rears its head again.

If Johnson City had an A or AA team, would Kingsport, Bristol and Elizabethton cover their games like they do their own Appy teams? NO. Johnson City is the only paper that could give a rats @$$ about Appy League baseball. Kingsport covers the Mets well, Bristol does the Sox well, we cover the Twins like crazy and Greeneville covers the Astros well. I will say this, if there was an A or AA team in JC, it might fare okay in JC but there wouldn't be many from this community that would attend games because they'd be pi**ed off about losing the Twins.

Marky, the Twins have one team beneath them - not one team. Kingsport also has one team beneath them in the same league, the GCL. When I said they were second lowest on the ladder I meant there was the GCL then Elizabethton then you have four teams ahead of them before MLB. Like I said, the Twins scouts do a helluva job. Minus the first rounder here and there we get the same 16th and 32nd picks that everybody else in the league has. Ours are just better.

Quote:The local inferiority complex rears its head again.

You are such a bozo...

You pick the one that doesnt fit..
Jacksonville
Birmingham
Johnson City
Knoxville
Chattanooga
Raliegh Durham

Hell, according to you, we shouldnt settle until we get a MLB franchise. I hear they are looking to move the Mariners. Maybe they could play in Johnson City!

Well, you know, those in Jackson, Mississippi, Jackson, Tennessee, Montgomery, Huntsville and Mobile don't have an inferiority complex compared to those teams.

I wonder why.

Oh, yeah. They're all in the Southern League.

But I'm a bozo because I want my area to be ranked with those towns. I want to be cosmopolitan. I don't think Elizabethton or a mindset that was prevailent in the days when Johnson City was 27,000 people should reign supreme.

And, did I read this right? The Tri-Cities doesn't belong with Chattanooga. You said it yourself.

THANK YOU DAVE MULLINS FOR BRINGING THIS MINDSET TO THE TRI-CITIES PEOPLE!

ETSUWes- I don't buy that. Elizabethton, Greeneville, and Bristol all staff ETSU games. Why wouldn't they staff a "Tri-Cities Pioneers" or whatever the team would be called in Class AA?

In fact, its more likely they would because such a franchise would bring with them their own media relations staff to give more information to the papers. So you'd know ahead of time who the players were- a bit on their backgrounds- etc.

You'd have legitimate advertising- probably in all of the papers. You'd have a real, honest-to-goodness radio broadcast crew.

I sometimes just throw my hands up around here. When I was in Wheeling, the Nailers would get four of their games on the over-the-air TV station- Channel 7. The Steubenville Stampede indoor football team would get a broadcast on Channel 9- as would the high school football team on tape delay at 11:30.

That's right. Instead of "The Tonight Show"- in Steubenville they'd put on the ball game. Locally produced. Locally broadcast.

Here, they say that we can't have a legitimate pro baseball franchise because the papers wouldn't staff it.

And let's not lose the main point here. Without the promise of a "Tri-Cities Pro Baseball Team," you can forget about ever seeing a new stadium for the Baseball Bucs.

By the way- you are right about the Twins farm system.

I had mistakenly counted the Twins DSL team as this site did-


http://www.minorleaguenews.com/baseball/....html#team

My bad.