I had this exact thought last year during my high school JV season. I was looking at the kids sitting on my bench thinking, "That kid can't swing a bat and that kid can't catch a ball, does playing a couple innings of a JV game really help them develop as a player? Wouldn't they be better off just practicing every day instead?" I know if you told a bunch of freshmen that being on the baseball team meant practicing for three months and never playing or even going to an actual game you would have about zero kids go out, so that's not really a workable idea. I think this could be very effective in pro baseball. I would say keep Triple A and Double A and eliminate every below. Basically run your development system like a season-long spring training. Most of the time is just practice and drills. Bring in another club to play a game against once or twice a week and then "graduate" players to your actual minor league teams. Same as with my JV kids, I really wonder how much more you could learn without constantly playing games and instead having time to stop and work on things in a controlled environment. And I really like the idea of putting everyone together. I remember as a JV high school player I learned as much if not more from being around and practicing with the juniors and seniors than just having coaches give us instructions. I'm thinking about international signings here. Right now you've got a 16 year old from the Dominican and he's playing and practicing with other 16 year olds who are at the same stage as he is. Put that kid with some 21, 22 year olds from the same culture and who have been through it before and I think he's going to be more comfortable and you'll probably get more out of him. I've been wanting to make a post about this for awhile but never had time to sit down and think it through. But basically from my untrained and unprofessional opinion, the current minor league system does not get the most out of players and ditching games for more "practice" and training would be more effective. You get a few at bats a game and you may not even have a ball hit to you on defense. However, the numbers of reps you can get at a practice are almost limitless.