Minor leagues are professional sports leagues which are not regarded as the premier leagues in those sports . Minor league teams tend to play in smaller, less elaborate venues, often competing in smaller cities/markets. This term is used in North America with regard to several organizations competing in various sports. They generally have lesser fan bases, much smaller revenues and salaries, and are used to develop players for bigger leagues.
48-656: The Mohawk Valley Landsharks were a minor league baseball team based in Little Falls, New York in the state's Mohawk Valley region. The team played its games in The Northeast League (later known as the Can-Am League . The Northeast League was an independent baseball league and as such none of its teams had an affiliation with Major League Baseball . The team existed for just one season, 1995, and played its home games at Little Falls Veterans Memorial Park . When
96-624: A developmental football league, Woods, a sports lawyer and executive director of the Medal of Honor Bowl , put that business plan in action to launch such a league in October 2014 that envisioned six franchises primarily based in minor league baseball stadiums. The Fall Experimental Football League was announced by Woods on May 7, 2014. Original targeted markets for teams were New York City , Boston , Omaha , Orlando , Portland, and either San Antonio or Memphis, Tennessee with Wednesday games. The league
144-527: A financial loss in the 2014 season, and Woods is said to have invested almost all of his personal wealth into the league by the end of the 2015 season. A franchise cost was set at $ 500,000. The Brooklyn Bolts was a joint venture between the league and Jeff Wilpon , owner of the New York Mets and Brooklyn Cyclones . The Blacktips and Omaha Mammoths were league owned and operated. The Brawlers were initially reported as being independently owned but no owner
192-573: A lesser extent ARCA and its ARCA Menards Series since ARCA's buyout by NASCAR in 2018); Monster Jam 's Triple Threat Series; Overwatch Contenders ; the FIA Formula 2 Championship and FIA Formula 3 Championship for Formula One ; and various other affiliated satellite tours of other individual sports, including the Challengers Tour of Professional Tennis. Fall Experimental Football League The Fall Experimental Football League ( FXFL )
240-669: A partnership with a minor league, following the Association of Professional Football Leagues of the 1940s, the Atlantic Coast Football League in the 1960s, NFL Europe of the 1990s and 2000s, and the NFL-owned teams in the Arena Football League (prior to 2008). Each FXFL team employed 40 players on their roster with a base salary of $ 1000 per game and a maximum potential payout of $ 1250 per game. (At least one team
288-475: A reserve team in the USL or officially affiliate with a separately owned USL team, but this was never strictly enforced. No formal relationship existed between NASL and the other leagues; NASL's commissioner had said he believed it would "stay that way for some time". However, MLS clubs started withdrawing their reserve sides from the USL system in 2020 amid rumors that MLS would relaunch its former MLS Reserve League in
336-526: A similar concept but did not pay its players and operated its seasons all in one location. After five seasons of play, TSL ceased operations as Woods assumed the presidency of a reboot of the United States Football League . As its name implies, the league adopted several experimental rule changes differing from those at other levels of the game with some at the request of the NFL. Initial plans for
384-697: A traveling team. The FXFL debuted on time with the inaugural game in Omaha on October 8, 2014 between the Omaha Mammoths and the Boston Brawlers at TD Ameritrade Park with the Mammoths winning 41–18. By Week 3 of the 2014 season, Nivea had become a sponsor of the league, with sponsor logo on the left shoulder and helmets; additionally, a reality web show on the FXFL appeared, sponsored by Nivea. The inaugural 2014 season
432-631: Is a North American indoor soccer league that serves as the developmental league of the Major Arena Soccer League . Minor league baseball is almost as old as the professional game itself, and at first consisted of attempts to play baseball in smaller cities and towns independent of the National League , the first true major league. Soon, scouts for the National League were traveling to watch minor league teams play and attempting to sign
480-500: Is a manifestation of the franchise system used in North American sports , whereby the group of major league teams in each sport is fixed for long periods between expansions or other adjustments, which only take place with the consent of the major league owners. In Europe , and many other parts of the world, association football (soccer), basketball, american football, baseball, handball, hockey, etc. leagues have many divisions below
528-796: Is expected to own two teams outright and four franchised teams. By June 20, Tommie Harris and Eric Bassey were announced as the first owners for a franchise in Austin, Texas , the Texas Outlaws, with other teams announced without ownership were New York, Boston, Omaha, Portland, Oregon and an unselected Florida city. On August 20, 2014, Woods announced that the league would consist of just four teams — Brooklyn , Boston , Omaha and Miami — with players released from NFL teams to allocated and reporting on September 24 with games to start October 8. Cities in which interest in franchises came from Columbus, Ohio , and Springfield, Missouri . The Miami team became
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#1733085616119576-549: Is standard for sports in both countries , the formal promotion and relegation system is not used, although teams have been informally "promoted" from lower leagues up to Major League Soccer. The United Soccer League operates the USL League Two (formerly the Premier Development League, or PDL), a semi-professional league that has some age restrictions. The National Premier Soccer League operates at approximately
624-544: Is the most prominent of the minor hockey leagues in North America. Minor League Cricket (MiLC) is a developmental league of Major League Cricket that began play in 2021. Other sports organizations considered to be minor leagues are golf's Korn Ferry Tour and Epson Tour , respectively affiliated with the PGA Tour and LPGA ; NASCAR 's Xfinity Series , Camping World Truck Series and Whelen All-American Series (and to
672-543: The Arena Football League in the mid-2000s, prior to its bankruptcy and restructuring. Arena football is played under very different conditions, and the AFL had its own minor league, af2 , until 2009. Several other independent indoor football leagues that play a similar game exist. Similarly, the Canadian Football League , though it has developed ties with the NFL in recent years and has moved away from competing with
720-541: The ECHL . On "the farm", the NHL team will develop young players, occasionally rehabilitate older players who are injured or whose quality of play has slumped. These teams, in turn, have lower-level minor leagues to draw players from and pass players down to. Minor professional ice hockey leagues should not be confused with Junior (amateur players) or Senior (semi-professional to amateur) ice hockey leagues. The American Hockey League
768-526: The National Football League (NFL). The NFL and its teams have had working relationships with several independent leagues in the past, including the Association of Professional Football Leagues , the Atlantic Coast Football League , and most recently, the league owned-and-operated NFL Europe . In modern times, the NFL has developed players not ready for the active roster through each team's practice squad . Several NFL owners had purchased teams in
816-539: The Tampa Bay Buccaneers , was signed to the Brooklyn Bolts for that year. Each team also had territorial rights to players, so any player in a team's territory was first choice is to that team. The league and team owners originally planned to arrange host families for the players, similar to other minor leagues; players instead were housed in hotels. The league operated under a budget of $ 8 to $ 9 million for
864-668: The United States Soccer Federation , but through the affiliated United States Adult Soccer Association . The USL organization has announced plans to create a full women's developmental pathway, establishing the semi-professional third-level USL W League (USLW; not to be confused with its former W-League) in 2022 and planning to launch the USL Super League (USLS) in 2023. The USL has applied for U.S. Soccer sanctioning of USLS; it has not yet announced its sanctioning plans for USLW. The Major Arena Soccer League 2 (M2)
912-429: The top-flight level as part of the football pyramid . In other parts of the world there is usually either a system of annual promotion and relegation , meaning that clubs have no fixed status in the hierarchy, or there is only one professional league per country in each sport, rendering the major/minor distinction irrelevant. While there are various semi-professional football leagues, none have any affiliation with
960-464: The "NBA D-League") and NBA Summer League . The now-defunct Continental Basketball Association (CBA) served some of the purposes of a minor league for the NBA for many years. However, there were no direct developmental agreements between CBA and NBA teams the way that there are between Major League Baseball and National Hockey League teams and their minor league affiliates. Pro Semi-Pro The sport with
1008-401: The FXFL were subject to lawsuit after folding, claiming he did not pay players, assistant coaches, cheerleaders and officials. In 2019 Woods settled and agreed to pay the plaintiffs $ 300,000. In the summer of 2013, Brian Woods began work on a business plan for a future football development league. With NFL executive vice president Troy Vincent indicating in an April 2014 interview a need for
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#17330856161191056-563: The Hudson Valley team's future, as the stadium owner had only offered a one-year trial lease to the team, and their lone season was marred by safety concerns and defections. The Brooklyn Bolts were the last holdout, waiting through summer 2016 for word from the league whether or not it would return, before the team's parent company announced in August that neither the league nor the Bolts would return for
1104-404: The NBA, every referee entering the league (in recent years) comes from NBA Development League . We can be a testing ground for proposed rules, too." The league has an agreement with the NFL to use officials from the elder league's training academy for FXFL games. Had the FXFL succeeded in establishing a formal partnership with the NFL, it would have been the fifth such time the NFL has established
1152-561: The NFL for talent, plays a visibly different game than the American game, and the two sports favor different types of skills; the CFL arguably holds major league status in its home territory of Canada . Several minor or developmental leagues, independent of the NFL, have come and gone. Some, such as the Alliance of American Football and Fall Experimental Football League (along with the FXFL's successor,
1200-524: The Northeast League was formed and played its first season in 1995 it was a 6-team league with all six teams being located in the State of New York . The Landsharks would be one of those six original teams. The Landsharks would have a very successful season in their first year, finishing 2nd in the league with a 47-23 record. They would make the Northeast League playoffs, but lose in the first round. Although
1248-674: The Omaha Mammoths would not return for 2015 and would be replaced by a team in the Hudson Valley , but that the Florida Blacktips would make a second attempt at establishing themselves in Florida. The league unexpectedly contracted the Brawlers on September 28, 2015, with the team's franchisee stating that the league demanded a large sum of money in order for the team to take the field for the 2015 season. The 2015 season also ended prematurely, with
1296-500: The Short-Season A level eliminated from the minor leagues, and all leagues above Rookie level in the affiliated system renamed. Also, four independent leagues were officially designated as "MLB Partner Leagues". In 2022, the leagues renamed in 2021 reverted to their traditional names. The National Basketball Association has affiliated minor leagues: the NBA G League (formerly called
1344-521: The South Network , Untamed TV, and Chicago's The U Too . In addition, ESPN3 held online streaming media rights. The broadcast deals provided no guaranteed revenue to the league but did offer a share of advertising; it is not known if the league paid for production expenses or airtime as the UFL had to do. Telecasts of FXFL games abruptly stopped midway through the 2015 season with the last two games on
1392-458: The advent of television; minor league clubs only survived in many markets because their major league affiliations included financial support. The trend began to reverse in the 1990s, as new independent minor leagues began for the first time in decades and have become successful to varying levels. In 2021, a major reorganization of the minor leagues saw the number of affiliated teams (i.e., those with formal links to MLB teams) reduced from 160 to 120,
1440-603: The coming years; these rumors were proved correct by the 2022 establishment of MLS Next Pro . MLS Next (stylized in all caps) is a system of youth soccer leagues that are managed, organized and controlled by Major League Soccer . It was introduced by the league in 2020. Semi-professional and amateur leagues sanctioned by the United States Adult Soccer Association are USL League Two , National Premier Soccer League , NISA Nation and United Premier Soccer League . The system, introduced in mid-2020,
1488-608: The fall season. The league announced a suspension of operations on September 2, 2016. Commissioner Brian Woods has reportedly expressed interest possibly using a former FXFL team's brand in an indoor football league, such as the Arena Football League . A team in the National Arena League acquired the rights to the Boston Brawlers name in August 2017. In 2017, Woods re-emerged as CEO of another minor professional football league, The Spring League , which operated on
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1536-404: The first season and expected to be able to be viable with minor or development team attendance of 3,000 plus. The league reported receiving enough financing to operate for the first season. The FXFL sold game film to NFL teams as an additional source of revenue. In the long term, the FXFL did not expect to be profitable without official NFL support, which it never received. The league operated at
1584-488: The large number of American-based teams is that minor league franchises will frequently move from city to city, and even between leagues. In contrast, Canadian cities more commonly host major junior teams, which develop teenage prospects prior to their move to the professional leagues. All National Hockey League teams have a farm team in the American Hockey League and often have a secondary affiliated team in
1632-509: The league (the league only lasted two years, rendering this rule moot); one anecdote had the league turning down Maurice Jones-Drew on account of his career being near its end (the anecdote may not be true, since Jones-Drew was already signed to a three-year deal with the Oakland Raiders before the league was founded). The league softened its stance on this stipulation for 2015; Josh Freeman , who spent four years as starting quarterback for
1680-479: The league had punting , the PAT and kickoffs taken out of the game, but this proposal was scrapped prior to the start of the season. Woods was quoted as saying about the new league: "Our long-term goal is to establish a partnership with the NFL and we feel can do that on many platforms. It would give them a way to work with younger players that they don't currently have. We can help them train prospective NFL officials—in
1728-460: The league office canceling the last regular season game days before it was scheduled to be played. Since the abrupt end of the 2015 season in October, there were no official statements made by the league (whether the Bolts could claim a championship given the extremely irregular schedule was left undecided) and the last posts on social media were made in December 2015. There was already doubt regarding
1776-484: The league was expected to place a franchise in that city for the 2015 season. The announcement also confirmed that the Brooklyn Bolts would return, the league would remain fixed at four teams for the 2015 season, and three out of four of the teams would be sharing a stadium with a New York–Penn League baseball team (this included the Bolts and the Ohio franchise). A later leak reported in the local newspaper The Vindicator that
1824-475: The more talented ones away. Soon Major League Baseball began formal developmental agreements with some minor league teams, while others remained independent . Since it was first developed in the 1920s by St. Louis Cardinals executive Branch Rickey , the formal developmental affiliations have come to dominate minor league baseball, and the majority of minor leagues are part of the affiliated system. A general decline in minor league attendance occurred following
1872-552: The next most extensive system of minor league teams other than baseball is ice hockey . In North America, between 1988 and 2005, 233 minor league ice hockey teams played in a total of 160 cities in 13 minor professional leagues. The vast majority of these teams played in the United States, with only 21 of these teams based in Canadian cities. 123 of these minor professional teams played in the southern United States. One reason given for
1920-556: The same level as USL League Two. In 2013 Major League Soccer announced a partnership with the USL organization which began formal affiliation between some USL teams and MLS teams. The partnership continued to deepen through the 2010s; by the end of that decade, most MLS teams fielded their reserve teams in the USLC, while a few had their reserve sides in USL1 instead of the USLC. For several years, MLS nominally required all of its teams to either field
1968-595: The still extant but non-paying The Spring League ), have explicit minor league and developmental aspirations. Others, such as the United Football League and both the 2001 and 2020 incarnations of the XFL, have sought to maintain independence and maintain a national profile while acknowledging the lack of funds (particularly from television, which is by far the NFL's largest revenue stream) that would be needed to compete for NFL-caliber talent. The UFL during its existence
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2016-528: The team played very well on the field, the club was plagued by poor attendance numbers. At the end of the season the team would fold and be replaced by The Rhode Island Tiger Sharks , who would suffer the same fate as the Landsharks, only lasting one season. This article about a baseball team in New York is a stub . You can help Misplaced Pages by expanding it . Minor league The minor league concept
2064-433: Was a professional football minor league that played two seasons in 2014 and 2015. This league's stated goal was to become a professional feeder-system for the National Football League (NFL). The league claimed 44 out of 126 players ended up on NFL rosters. After the FXFL ceased operations, FXFL founder and CEO Brian Woods made another attempt at an NFL feeder-system by creating The Spring League in 2017. Woods and
2112-531: Was active for the first time during the 2020–21 season. It is a successor to the U.S. Soccer Development Academy . The system covers the under-13, under-14, under-15, under-16, under-17 and under-19 age groups. The developmental pathway for players outside the collegiate system has so far been mostly an ad hoc affair, with semi-professional and amateur leagues including the former USL W-League . The current United Women's Soccer , UWS League 2 and Women's Premier Soccer League not being sanctioned directly through
2160-937: Was cut short after the November 7 contest, with one regular season game and a championship left unplayed. The decision was made that the Bolts, the team with the best record at 4–0, would be declared the first FXFL Champions, according to ESPN3 . In a report from the Associated Press , commissioner Brian Woods said that he was satisfied with the season and said he envisioned a bigger FXFL in 2015, with more affiliations with minor league baseball teams and stadia, targeting such cities as Memphis , Austin , Oklahoma City and somewhere in Florida. Woods also expected Brooklyn and Omaha to return. Woods later backed off plans for expansion and said that 2015 would most likely only have five teams at most. WYTV in Niles, Ohio reported on July 10, 2015 that
2208-699: Was ever identified and the league later admitted that that was not true. For 2015, the franchise was to be operated by the Mahoning Valley Scrappers minor league baseball team. The Hudson Valley franchise was to be held by the Hudson Valley Renegades . The league syndicated its games to a collection of 14 regional channels , digital subchannel networks, and broadcast stations, including SportsNet New York , New England Sports Network (both its main and national feeds), Cox Sports (New Orleans) , Cox San Diego , Altitude , Tuff TV , Soul of
2256-549: Was paying as little as $ 300 per game in the 2015 season. ) The league mainly recruited those who were released from NFL training camps in August and not assigned to practice squads with the players being pooled then allocated to the teams and transferable at the league's discretion. Those that could not go or would not go to college were also considered, but the league did not actively recruit NCAA players. The league also did not pursue experienced professional players and intended not to allow any player to play more than three years in
2304-506: Was recognized and accepted as the second tier of professional football behind the NFL, with several former NFL stars playing in the UFL near the ends of their careers. High-level Low-level High-level Mid-level Low-level Below Major League Soccer several lower-level leagues operate on both sides of the U.S.–Canada border as part of the American and Canadian soccer pyramids. As
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