While we have been contending with ice and snow, and temperatures below freezing, my mind has begun yearning for warmer days and the pending baseball season.

However, I’m disappointed with the way Major League Baseball has restructured the minor leagues. We outlined in the past how MLB has taken over the business entity known as Minor League Baseball, and had plans to eliminate 40 minor league teams around the country, and restructure the remaining teams into geographical divisions.

As a business move, I understood the reasoning behind eliminating some teams, and it made sense. Many small towns, had very old and outdated ballparks, and just couldn’t provide the players the type of workout facilities, indoor practice space, or other amenities that today’s MLB teams require. I’m a baseball purist and love the history of the game, and admittedly it was sad to see cities who had supported a minor league team for over a hundred years, have that team yanked from existence. Those towns were the losers in all of this.

Another argument in favor of eliminating some teams, is that the hierarchy of baseball had grown way too large, with some MLB teams fielding six or seven minor league teams. That does many things, including watering down the caliber of players in their developmental system, making it extremely obvious that most of those players would never take an at bat in a big-league game. It also was very expensive to operate that many minor league teams, with very little upside for the MLB parent club.

Restructuring has taken place, and the one thing that makes me the most upset is that MLB threw out the tradition and history of leagues that have been in place since the late 1800s. Instead of keeping with tradition, and keeping the names of the most iconic sports leagues in the country, MLB has decided to name the leagues according to level and geographic region.

In other words, starting at the top of the minor league hierarchy, you have the Triple-A East League with the Northeast Division, Midwest Division and Southeast Division. Then you have the Triple-A West League with the East and West Divisions. Come on man!

Gone are the traditional names of the past; in Triple-A – International League and Pacific Coast League, in Double-A – Eastern, Southern and Texas Leagues, in Single-A – California, South Atlantic, and Florida State Leagues. These names have been removed from the baseball vernacular.

Yes, that’s right, the Tulsa Drillers will no longer be playing in the Texas League. Instead, they will be in the North Division of the Double-A Central League. Could this be a sign of the end times?

The Double-A Central League will be made up of all the teams that last played in the Texas League in 2019, plus two new cities (San Antonio and Wichita) who used to be in the Texas League.

Here’s the breakdown of the new Double-A Central League, and the teams’ MLB affiliate. The North Division will include the Arkansas Travelers (Sea.), Northwest Arkansas Naturals (KC), Springfield Cardinals (STL), Tulsa Drillers (LA), and Wichita (Minn.). In the South Division are Amarillo Sod Poodles (Ariz.), Corpus Christi Hooks (Hou.), Frisco RoughRiders (Tex.), Midland RockHounds (Oak.), and San Antonio Missions (SD).

So, the question still remains, will any of the Texas League records be carried over to this new Double-A Central League? The baseball executives have not made that clear at this time, and frankly, I don’t think they care about minor league record books. Their sole interest is in the Major League team and developing their minor league players. They care about the players individual stats, of course, as a measurement of advancement, but they don’t care whether their players set a minor league stolen base record or won the minor league’s batting title.

The city that has taken the toughest beating in all of this restructuring has to be Fresno, Calif. The Fresno Grizzlies play in the beautiful 10,650 seat Chukchansi Park, that opened in 2002, and has been home to Triple-A level baseball for 23 seasons. As a part of this minor league restructuring, the Grizzlies will now play in the Single-A Low-A West League. Fresno fans will go from watching guys on the cusp of playing for the Washington Nationals, and many that go back and forth to the Major League team, to watching a team of mostly rookies, first-year minor leaguers, hoping to someday play for the Colorado Rockies.

Sending Grizzlies fans a sympathy card is on my to-do list.

If you’d like to see the complete list of leagues, teams and affiliations, it can be found on my Twitter feed; @JeffBSports.