Sox Scoops 45.042: Sox AAA and AA Teams Take Championships, Completing Magical Minor League Season

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Sox Scoops 45.042: Sox AAA and AA Teams Take Championships, Completing Magical Minor League Season

Post by HoosierVic » Wed Jan 27, 2021 12:59 pm

By Rick Mariotti
Minor Leagues Beat Writer
Chicago Sports Online


The top two minor league teams in Chicago’s system finished their seasons by winning their respective championships, finishing a magical year for the franchise.

With the wins by the AAA Carolina Flight and AA Beloit Blue Sox, the five-team Chicago system won three minor league titles and finished as runners up in two. Put another way, every team made its league championship series and 60 percent of them closed the deal.

Carolina turned a fast start (20-8 in April) into a wire-to-wire win in the Granville East Coast Division, putting up a league-best 90-54 record.

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The Flight won the division by 6 games over Gotham (Jacksonville), then ousted the Heroes in a 2-1 victory in their best-of-three first round series.

Carolina followed that up by beat the Commerce Yard Goats (Long Beach) 2-1 in the second round, and seized the Rupert Horn League title with a with 3-1 win over the Los Cabos Corsairs (Mexico City) in the championship round.

The title was just the second in franchise history, and the first since 2021. The 2045 season also marked just the second time the team has hit the 90-win mark. The other instance? In their 2021 championship year, when the Flight went 93-69.

It should be noted that Carolina won its championship despite losing rotation ace Bernie Stuart (13-4, 2.99 ERA) in August when he was promoted to Chicago following a season-ending elbow injury to SP David Bates. Despite the loss, Carolina’s pitching staff still ranked second in the Granville Subleague with a 3.19 ERA.

The Beloit Blue Sox, meanwhile, took a different path to the Warren Cox League championship, struggling out of the gate and tangling all season long with the Duluth Dragons (Calgary) in a fierce fight for the Mid-Central Division crown. Beloit finally wrapped up the division in August, finishing at 94-46, just 3 games clear of Duluth.

Beloit swept through the early rounds of the playoffs, though, taking out the Dragons 2-0 in the first round, and the Anderson Joes (San Fernando) 2-0 in the second round.

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The Mississauga Spartans (Montreal) were a tougher task in the championship round, however, as Beloit had to come back from the brink of elimination to win the final two games of the best-of-five series by 10-7 and 7-3 scores.

Beloit’s title was the second in team history. The first came in 2041, and kicked off the longest playoff run in franchise history: the Blue Sox have now made the post-season five years in a row. This season’s 94 wins was also a franchise record – as was the attendance of 1,006,993.

“It’s been a marvelous run for Beloit and, indeed, for our entire minor league system,” said Benny Vitale, general manager of the Chicago Black Sox. “But this is no time to rest on our laurels. I challenge our system to come back next year and do even better.

“I realize that’s no small task, but our job is to demand the impossible. Our managers’ job is to achieve it.”

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