Message #2066893

[bluestreak]

Trying really hard to understand why people care about where the Nats AAA team in located...

It’s the worst possible scenario,” a rival GM said of Washington’s plight, which involves incoming players taking a 6 1/2-hour red-eye to D.C. for a day game or a 6 a.m. fight to arrive in time for a night game. “It’s a much bigger deal than people think.”

It’s 2,796 miles from Fresno’s stadium to Nationals Park, more than double the commute of the second-farthest Triple-A team, which is the Los Angeles Dodgers’ affiliate — one in which they have an ownership stake — in Oklahoma City. Just two other clubs have their Triple-A team more than 1,000 miles away: the Milwaukee Brewers’ brand-new affiliate in San Antonio and the Minnesota Twins’ team in Rochester

So what, you might be thinking, these players have to sit on a plane for a long time and be sleep deprived. That comes with the territory. But in an age when player development is a major part of an organization’s lifeline, and in a season in which the Nationals’ depth has been continually tested, why make things harder than they have to be?

It’s not just about the late-night moves that have been made. It’s the transactions that haven’t occurred because Fresno is on the other side of the country and there’s a late injury or a day game the next day. It’s about stashing guys at Double-A Harrisburg in the event of an emergency, demoting relievers with a cross-country ticket and a long time to think about what they’ve done (or failed to do).

The Mets know all about those struggles. They left Las Vegas after years of struggling to get players to New York on time and sometimes even playing short-handed. They were more than happy to ditch the hitter-friendly Pacific Coast League, which made it tougher to evaluate their talent.

“It’s not ideal,” said former Mets general manager Sandy Alderson, who was with New York until July 2018, when he took a leave of absence because of a reoccurrence of cancer. “Vegas to New York had a lot of flights for obvious reasons. But Fresno isn’t Vegas. It’s a lot tougher to get out of there, I’d imagine.