Midwest League

And they went on a playoff run too.

They won, they won the Midwest League, if I'm not mistaken, Quad Cities.

So my guess is they would probably end up, uh, sending Rose to Northwest Arkansas.

He starts in double-A to begin the season.

in the, in the early spring.

We're in the two areas of the country.

I mean, you're a Midwest guy, squarely in the middle of the map for the Midwest League.

I'm kinda squarely in the middle of the map for the Eastern League.

And, uh, We're not going to get to those awards quite yet in our talk here, but since Kyle mentioned it, I had a faux pas last week.

When I talked about the All-Stars across the Cardinal system, I left off Josiah Ragsdale, who was named a Midwest League All-Star, primarily for his work, obviously, when he was, well, not primarily, completely, for his work when he was in the Milwaukee system.

But still, certainly we want to tip our cap to Josiah Ragsdale, who was a double, excuse me, a high A All-Star.

uh, in the Midwest league.

Yeah, Brian.

And to go along with that, uh, I believe it was last night, MLB pipeline put out their first team and second team, um, all minor league, all prospect team.

I play when I, that was when I first got to Minnesota that I got traded.

I play in the Midwest league where it's like me able.

And then when I got to spring training, I was practicing with a double A team, and I hit very well.

And they decided not to move me too fast because I was very young, so they wanted me to play in the Florida State League, which is like the high A, because it's a tough league to play.

I don't think we're seeing anything like double A in terms of the minor leagues.

If you checked in with those numbers, like the Texas League or the Midwest League, even the Florida State League, which is known as a graveyard for baseball, is basically MPB.

They're putting up historical numbers in terms of home runs and power and stuff.

So it's kind of...

Chucky D., Chuck Davilon.

ended up winning Midwest League Player of the Year.

Had a tremendous year for the Loons.

Outfielder, got to see him a whole bunch.

291-400 on base percentage, 532 slugging.

He walked more than he struck out, and he hit for a decent amount of power.

24 home runs, I believe, was really a spark in this offense that led Great Lakes to a second-half Midwest League East Division title.

They ended up making the playoffs.

But while the Iron Pigs led all of minor league baseball in total attendance, the team that led in per-game average but played fewer games...

In the Class A, high A Midwest League, the Dayton Dragons averaged 7,863 fans, the tops in minor league baseball.

They now have a sellout streak going back to their year 2000 inception, and they punch way above their weight.

I think they're the only team below triple A.

And it was the owner of a sports bar in North Fond du Lac, Wisconsin.

And his, his name is James Forsyth, the owner.

And so I talked to Chris Merring, the longtime broadcaster, the Dean of the Midwest league and, Wisconsin Timber Rattlers icon whose photo of Uribe first made it all go viral.

I talked to Chris Merring along with James Forsyth, the winning bidder for the jersey, about how all this came to be.

It's ball one.

Juan Marichal started pitching in organized baseball at Michigan City in the Midwest League in 1958.

Won 21 games there in his first season.

He was playing here in the Eastern League the next year and won 18.

Home plate umpire Paul Pryor with his right arm about halfway up, and then he pulled it down quickly, just missing one ball, two strikes.

Marichal in his first year in 58 led the league in victories with 21.

That was the Midwest league.

His next year he led the league in victories with 18 in the Eastern League.