A month ago, the Pirates officially lost one of their minor league affiliates when the Bristol Pirates and the rest of the Appalachian League agreed to become a collegiate wooden bat league.
Now it’s looking like another affiliate could meet a similar fate.
Major League Baseball is proposing converting the New York-Penn League into a collegiate wooden bat league for rising seniors ahead of the amateur draft, according to J.J. Cooper of Baseball America. The Pirates’ short-season A affiliate, the West Virginia Black Bears, play in that league.
DK Pittsburgh Sports reached out to the Black Bears, who declined to comment as to respect the process the league and MLB are going through.
The Black Bears were not originally listed as one of the teams MLB proposed cutting after the 2020 season. Some of the teams in the league could change their affiliation or class. MLB is trying to keep some sort of baseball presence in areas that are losing an affiliated club.
MLB took over the minor leagues this year, ending a 119 year run of the minors’ independence.
The Pirates’ partnership with the Black Bears dates back to 2013, when they were the Jamestown Jammers. The franchise relocated from New York to Morgantown, W.Va. in 2015, sharing Monongalia County Ballpark with West Virginia University.
Even if the New York-Penn League does not convert to a collegiate league, it will undergo significant changes since the amateur draft has been pushed back to All-Star week rather than early June. This league is typically the first stop for drafted college players, so that streamline of players would be cut off for the Black Bears.
The Pirates’ other minor league affiliates are the class AAA Indianapolis Indians, AA Altoona Curve, High-A Bradenton Marauders and A-level Greensboro Grasshoppers and the Gulf Coast League Pirates, which are based out of Bradenton, Fla.
The Bristol Pirates were formerly another rookie level club, but the league lost its affiliation with minor league baseball last month.
