Contraction chatter not slowing minor league job seekers

SAN DIEGO (AP) — Jack Wang came all the way from Taiwan, well aware of the hurdles and long odds to pursuing a career in baseball.

All this talk of minor league contraction isn’t shaking him off his dream.

“It’s just not in my mind,” he said.

Wang is among over 400 young professionals submitting resumes and networking with executives during the annual minor league job fair at this week’s baseball winter meetings in San Diego. Never mind that Major League Baseball proposed last month to cut 42 of the 160 affiliated minor league clubs after next season. The eager applicants are still hot in pursuit of internships and entry-level jobs they hope will jump-start a lifelong career in sports.

“The most important thing is you need to get a ticket,” said Wang, a 26-year-old with a civil engineering degree who wants to work in sports analytics. “That’s what I’m trying to do right now.”

It’s been an unusual week for the job fair. On the one hand, there have been about 520 job openings posted by minor and major league teams, a record total for the event.

On the other, it’s impossible to ignore MLB’s proposal to chop more than a quarter of the minor leagues, an idea delivered during negotiations with the National Association of Professional Baseball Leagues to replace their contract that expires after the 2020 season.

Minor League Baseball President Pat O’Conner gave a fiery speech to team executives early in the week defending their continued existence, while front office employees are speaking anxiously about their futures over cocktails after dark.

Their predicament has become a national matter, with baseball fans in small towns across the country furious that their hometown team is on the chopping block. Presidential candidate Bernie Sanders...

source https://www.chron.com/news/education/article/Contraction-chatter-not-slowing-minor-league-job-14897900.php