The Fundamental Question is ... well, fundamental: If we weren't already doing it this way, is this how we would do it?
This struck me again when I learned that every minor-league team does not have a Spanish-speaking coach. For some reason, I'd just assumed that this had happened years ago. But it hadn't.
The Dodgers are changing that this year, though:
Each Dodgers minor league team will have three coaches this year, up from two last year. The reason for that, Kapler explained Monday on a conference call, is to ensure that each staff would have a Spanish-speaking coach.
"It's tremendously important, particularly at the lower levels, but even at the upper levels because cultural assimilation for us organizationally is as important as probably any other element of player development," Kapler said.
I'm going to guess this hasn't already happened in every organization because a) franchises didn't want to assume the expense of another six or seven coaches in the organization, and b) not adding an extra coach, but requiring that one of your coaches does speak Spanish, would mean a smaller pool of candidates for the positions that are available.
But how much money are we talking about here? I'm guessing minor-league coaches make somewhere between $50,000 and $100,000 per season, depending on level and experience. So let's say 75K per coach. Figure seven additional coaches, and we're talking roughly $500,000.
Which doesn't seem like a lot, especially compared to Ryan Howard's contract. But everybody's got a budget, so that's $500,000 that can't be spent on ... whatever.
Well, unless you're the Dodgers or a few other teams. In which case, Peter probably doesn't have to worry about getting robbed, and it's hard to imagine why any rich franchise wouldn't have done this years ago.
