Columnist Dean Juipe: Triple-A deal may, may not up visibility

Dean Juipe

Friday, July 18, 1997 | 9:37 a.m.

THIRTY-SOME years ago as a boy growing up in the Midwest and with a boundless interest in baseball, the Pacific Coast League had a certain allure. You had to read the fine print in The Sporting News to keep pace with the league, but it was worth the effort.

The PCL had interesting cities and seemingly interesting players. There were guys with familiar names on their way down from the major leagues, and guys with unfamiliar names on their way up.

Knowing the league champion and reciting the league's individual statistical leaders wasn't a problem.

The PCL was the best and probably the coolest of the minor leagues.

Maybe it still is, but times have changed and seeing the PCL teams and players on a firsthand basis for a dozen years may have taken the luster off the league if not the childhood fantasy.

Quick: Name the reigning PCL champion or any recent PCL statistical leader.

It almost can't be done.

The PCL, along with its triple-A counterparts the American Association and the International League, has blended in with the scenery. With even the basic cable TV subscriber able to pick and choose among dozens of major-league games every week, minor-league baseball is more out-of-sight, out-of-mind than ever.

Don Logan, general manager of the PCL's Las Vegas Stars, wouldn't necessarily agree with the latter assessment. He looks at pockets of interest throughout America and cites statistics that would indicate the game is hot. "There are some great success stories going on," he said this week.

Yet he favors a move announced last week in which the three triple-A leagues would partially merge, with interleague games, a triple-A World Series and perhaps a televised game of the week driving the deal.

"There's a bunch of different reasons why I came to favor it," Logan said. "If nothing else, I can't argue with the prospect of seeing the Cubs and White Sox (triple-A) teams playing here."

Change for change's sake?

"No, not necessarily," he said. "The idea had been floated before. We just needed to see if the scenario and a schedule could make sense."

The Stars -- who open a four-game homestand tonight at Cashman Field -- will make fewer trips to Canada after the plan is implemented in 1998, so they favor the move from a travel-expense standpoint as well. Logan said he thought the PCL would keep its identity -- there's an Aug. 12 meeting in Denver to iron out the details -- and that a television network like Fox could be contracted for a game of the week. "They're looking for programming and this is a golden opportunity," he said.

As for who will watch an Iowa vs. Colorado Springs game when the Angels-Mariners, Rockies-Braves and Yankees-Red Sox might also be on is up for debate. Minor-league baseball has never had a TV niche and it's difficult to picture one developing now.

But the minors feel they have to do something, have to at least try to remind people that they're there.

It's an approach they didn't need to consider in simpler, less-cluttered times.