Paul TostoLife in baseball’s low minor leagues means horrible food, long bus rides and lousy living conditions — just like in the movie “Bull Durham,” but with no Susan Sarandon.
These days, though, it’s not necessarily all that horrible, especially if you’re a kid playing low A ball for the Minnesota Twins.
The News-Press of Fort Myers, Florida, has a nice story and video on the new Twins player development academy. All the prospects live under one roof in really nice digs. Really nice.
Minnesota Twins player development academy photo gallery… http://t.co/ImLV4nDVI8 pic.twitter.com/nJYZt4g8M5
— Kinfay (@Kinfay) July 25, 2014
It’s like an uber-dorm with all the really cool stuff — daily housekeeping, great food, Xboxes and a fun common room — without, apparently, the drunkenness and debauchery that typically comes with regular college roommates.
And you get to play baseball.
Yeah, many of these guys will not make it to the big leagues for more than a cup of coffee. They’ll have to get real jobs at some point. Former Red Sox minor leaguer Dusty Brown used to describe himself on Twitter as “One bad season away from having a day job!”
The grind of crappy living conditions, though, used to be the price players paid to chase that dream.
The Twins are taking the edge off the grind. It’ll be interesting to watch if that approach delivers better players.