RIP Ben’s Biz Blog
Ben’s Biz Blog is dead. Long live Ben’s Biz Blog.
Throughout my career writing about the business and culture of Minor League Baseball, I have always been identified by the sobriquet of “blogger.” As the years went by I tried to push back against this somewhat, pointing out that much of my writing appears on MiLB.com and that the blog is merely one aspect of what I do.
It never seemed to matter much. I have gotten used to people referring to my MiLB.com articles as blog posts, and realize that to many of my readers everything I write is viewed as a blog post no matter where it appears. I have found this to be mildly annoying but mostly I’m just happy to be recognized, and, more importantly, to have carved out an unlikely career covering a sports niche that had never been covered as such on a full-time basis.
But now it’s official: Ben’s Biz Blog — as in bensbiz.mlblogs.com, as in where you are reading this right now — is defunct. This post will be the last at this URL, concluding a writing project that began in October 2007 and has since comprised over 1700 posts (including full reports from visits to 174 Minor League Baseball ballparks).
This is not as big a change as it may seem. I’m still doing what I’ve always done — covering the business and culture of Minor League Baseball — except that now all of it is exclusively at MiLB.com. Specifically, my work can be found here:
https://www.milb.com/fans/bensbiz
This is, in many ways, a simple matter of housekeeping more than anything else. But I do want to acknowledge just how important Ben’s Biz Blog has been to me and my career. It began in October 2007, as an extension of the work I had been doing with my “Promo Preview” column over the past two seasons. That first post was titled, fittingly enough, “There is No Offseason.”
The blog took off quickly from there, as in those days social media was in its infancy and it was much more difficult to learn about the creative things that teams were doing. I took pride in serving as a curator, scouring the landscape and sharing the best ideas on a near-daily basis.
Over the years, social media (and in particular, Twitter) made this aspect of the blog less essential. Twitter, after all, is a “micro-blogging” site, and I ended up covering Minor League news in real time via this forum (@bensbiz, of course). Meanwhile, “Exploring America Through Minor League Baseball” became an increasing focus of mine. From 2010 through 2018, I chronicled every ballpark visit I made in great detail on this blog. In that time I visited every active ballpark in the Minor League landscape (as well as 15 that are now defunct).
Year-by-year archival posts, summarizing my ballpark visits, can be found HERE. All “On the Road” posts are HERE, and all Designated Eater posts are HERE.
While this blog will no longer be updated, it certainly isn’t going anywhere. It is my hope that the its material (especially that which is linked to above) will continue to be read and enjoyed for years to come. I’ll do my part in that regard, sharing memorable posts on social media and linking back to them (when applicable) in my MiLB.com stories. And this is the internet, after all. It will take a long time for my work here to decay into digital garbage. Hopefully it never does.
Thanks to everyone who, through the years, has read, commented, written guest posts or otherwise gotten in touch with me because of material on this blog. Even if I’m no longer posting on “Ben’s Biz Blog,” I realize that I’ll probably be identified as a “blogger” for years to come, and quite possibly for the remainder of my professional existence.
I’m okay with that.
Ben’s Biz Blog is dead.
Long live Ben’s Biz Blog.
