Five years ago last month, Eric and I started Bus Leagues Baseball. I’ve always remembered the site’s creation as being pretty simple, with a late night Gmail chat about a possible collaboration on minor league baseball inspiring Eric to start a WordPress blog (with a name taken from an expletive-filled line uttered by Crash Davis in the film “Bull Durham”, which always served as our inspiration. The movie, that is, not the language) and...

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Welcome to awards season at Bus Leagues! Once again, we will have nine to hand out: Full-season, Short-season and Independent League Player, Starter and Reliever of the Year. These players are the best of the best of minor league baseball, except for the short-season starter I forgot to put on the ballot and didn’t realize until it was too late. Voting works like the college football polls. Voters selected five players from a list...

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Welcome to awards season at Bus Leagues! Once again, we will have nine to hand out: Full-season, Short-season and Independent League Player, Starter and Reliever of the Year. These players are the best of the best of minor league baseball, except for the short-season starter I forgot to put on the ballot and didn’t realize until it was too late. Voting works like the college football polls. Voters selected five players from a list...

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This is it for the Bus Leagues Express. There are so few games remaining in the season that full entries will not be necessary. Thanks for visiting and following along this season. Top stories Reno wins first championship: In just their 4th season, the Reno Aces have won their first Pacific Coast League Championship. They defeated Omaha 8-2 Saturday to clinch the series and earn the right to play Pawtucket in the AAA National...

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Top stories BayBears win championship behind Bolsinger: Despite losing key players like Trevor Bauer, Tyler Skaggs and Marc Krauss over the course of the season, Mobile captured the Southern League Championship with a 1-0 win over Jackson. After James Paxton dominated them in game one, the BayBears took three straight to close out the series. Michael Bolsinger struck out five in seven scoreless innings to cap off a solid season with a 3.35 ERA...

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Top stories Pawtucket punches ticket to Durham: With their 4-1 win over Charlotte, the Pawtucket Red Sox swept the Knights to win their first International League Championship since 1984. Their pitching really carried the team in the postseason, especially in the finals against Charlotte. After their regular season offense proved to be good but not quite great, the Knights were only able to score three runs in three games against Pawtucket. Nelson Figueroa won...

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Top stories Stewart dominates old organization to give Pawtucket commanding lead: Before he was involved in the trade that brought Kevin Youkilis to the White Sox, Zach Stewart was set to make his 2012 debut for the Charlotte Knights. Instead, he would be assigned to Pawtucket and would pitch against Charlotte a few days later. He got another chance against his former teammates in the International League Championship, and it was likely his best...

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Top stories Home runs lead to early exit for Odorizzi: Although Omaha scored the first run in the PCL Championship, their lead was short lived. From the 2nd to 4th innings, Reno got to Jake Odorizzi four nine runs, and the Royals prospect couldn’t complete the 4th inning. In 3.2 innings, Odorizzi allowed four home runs, two to Ryan Budde and the others to Mike Jacobs and Tyler Kuhn. With plenty of run support,...

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