Pirates to pay their minor league players through at least June

The Pittsburgh Pirates have committed to pay their minor leaguers $400 per week through the month of June.

The Athletic’s Stephen J. Nesbitt had the report.

Nesbitt also reported that so far, the Pirates have not cut any individual minor league players.

This has been a sad week for baseball. It is looking more and more likely that the owners and players will not get an agreement hammered out to have baseball in 2020. Hundreds of minor league players lost their jobs this week. The future of the sport in general looks as bleak as I can ever remember.

In total, 22 teams cut minor league players this week. The Arizona Diamondbacks cut just over 60 total players in what looks like the most by any team in the baseball. Many of these teams have committed to paying their minor league players (that they kept) in the future. That said, it’s hard for me to applaud them for doing so when so many players were cut in the first place.

The Oakland Athletics stopped paying their minor league players altogether. That is honestly pathetic.

Thus far, the Pirates have made the right move in continuing to support all of their minor league players. ALL of them. Although they have only committed to paying them through June, I would hope they would extend that pay on a month to month basis.

Some teams are doing the right thing when it comes to supporting their minor league players. Sadly enough, most teams are not.