Professional Baseball Agreement

The contractual obligation between a Major League Baseball club and the Triple-A Minor League Baseball affiliate is a standard player development contract with very clear responsibilities. Both teams have an obligation to follow the Professional Baseball Agreement, which is available in two- and four-year increments, and always expires after an even year. In an affiliation agreement, here’s how the responsibilities shake out:

Related: Pitch Perfect

Triple-A Affiliate is responsible for:

• Maintaining clubhouse with certain dimensions, amenities, capacities, weight room, dining facility, locker room, coaches offices, batting facility, etc.
• Access to a professionally manicured Triple-A baseball field that is safe and meets professional lighting standards
• All road travel for the team: team flights, buses, hotel accommodations (two players to a room; coaches have their own room). Max number of rooms for any road trip is 18. The player roster is 25. If the team needs more than 18 rooms for guest players, coaches or others, MLB pays for additional rooms
• Uniforms, jackets, sleeves, stirrups, socks and hats
• All stadium personnel and ushers
• All revenue generated by the stadium, goes to the Triple-A affiliate

Major League Baseball is responsible for:

• Meal money
• Bats, balls, catcher’s equipment, coaches’ fungo bats
• Players, coaches and trainers’ salaries

Shared responsibilities:

• Both teams share the cost of the clubie (clubhouse manager.) MLB pays roughly 70 percent and MiLB pays the remaining 30 percent. Anything over that threshold is paid for by MLB. The San Francisco Giants typically pay its clubies well-above average salaries.
• The clubie washes and dries the uniforms, cleans the shoes, puts food out, manages the bat boys/girls, vacuums, keeps inventory of all the equipment, packs team up for road trips, takes team to the airport and picks them up, keeps locker room clean and takes care of any special requests and needs.