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From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

In sports, a farm team, farm system, feeder team, or nursery club is generally a team or club whose role is to provide experience and training for young players, with an agreement that any successful players can move on to a higher level at a given point, usually in an association with a major-level parent team. This system can be implemented in many ways, both formally and informally. It is not to be confused with a practice squad, which fulfills a similar developmental purpose but the players on the practice squad are members of the parent team.

The term is also used as a metaphor for any organization or activity that serves as a training ground for higher-level endeavors. For instance, business schools are occasionally referred to as "farm clubs" in the world of business.[citation needed]

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Contracted farm teams



Minor league teams are usually based in smaller cities (although both the New York Yankees and the cross-town rival New York Mets each have a low-level minor-league affiliate actually based elsewhere within New York City), and players who are contracted to them, as opposed to major league players sent down to this level for rehabilitation or other professional-development assignments, are typically paid significantly less than their Major League counterparts.

Most major league players start off their careers by working their way up the minor league system, from the lowest (Rookie) to the highest (AAA) classification, with the rare exceptions usually being those players signed from Japan's Nippon Professional Baseball. Since the elimination of the Bonus Rule, only a very small number of amateur players have gone directly into the MLB, including John Olerud, Jim Abbott, and Dave Winfield. The process of a player working his way up through the minor leagues is formally referred by most MLB teams as "player development". However, minor league affiliates are often informally referred to as "farm teams" and a major league player's misfortune of being sent back to the minors is sometimes described as being "farmed out".

The farm system as it is recognized today was invented by Branch Rickey,[1] who – as field manager, general manager, and club president – helped to build the St. Louis Cardinals dynasty during the 1920s, 30s, and 40s. When Rickey joined the team in 1916, players were commonly purchased by major league teams from independent, high-level minor league clubs.

Rickey, a keen judge of talent, became frustrated when the players he had identified for purchase at the A and AA levels were offered for bid and sold by those independent clubs to wealthier rivals such as the Chicago Cubs and the New York Giants. With the support of Cardinal owner Sam Breadon, Rickey devised a plan whereby St. Louis would purchase and control its own minor league teams from Class D to Class AA (the highest level at the time), thus allowing them to promote or demote players as they developed, and "grow" their own talent.


The Cardinals won nine National League pennants and six World Series championships between 1926 and 1946, proving the effectiveness of the farm system concept. Indeed, the second club to fully embrace such a system, the New York Yankees, used it to sustain their dynasty from the mid-1930s through the middle of the 1960s. When Rickey moved to the Brooklyn Dodgers as president and general manager in 1943, he built a hugely successful farm system there as well after the end of World War II. The teams that ignored the farm system in the 1930s and early 1940s (such as the Philadelphia A's and Phillies and the Washington Senators) found themselves falling on hard times.


American Hockey League teams are affiliated with a National Hockey League franchise, acting as their farm teams.

Ice hockey

The teams of the National Hockey League also have their own farm teams in the American Hockey League (AHL). For example, the Cleveland Monsters are the farm team for the Columbus Blue Jackets. Additionally, NHL teams have affiliates in the ECHL, although the terms of the most recent CBA (expired in 2012)[needs update] prohibited ECHL players from being recalled to the NHL or being sent down to that league without being assigned to the AHL first; thus, ECHL teams are de facto affiliated to their respective NHL-partner's farm team in the AHL. Although some NHL franchises own their AHL and/or ECHL affiliates, many AHL and ECHL franchises are independently owned, with ties to NHL franchises made through affiliation contracts.


Internal feeder teams

Association football

In many clubs, there will be internal feeder teams. These may be age-restricted teams, such as an 'Under-18s' team, or an 'A team'. For example, in international association football, national teams also operate youth sides—see England national under-21 football team, for example.

In the United States, some Major League Soccer teams previously had reserve teams in the MLS Reserve League. Now all are nominally required to field a reserve team or an affiliate in a professional league operated by the United Soccer League—either the USL Championship, which occupies the second tier of the United States soccer league system, or USL League One, one of two leagues sharing third-tier status. This requirement has yet to be strictly enforced.[2]





League-owned farm leagues

American football



The XFL (2020) established a hybrid between a practice squad and a farm team, what it dubbed "Team 9:" operated with the same autonomy as the other eight teams, with its own roster and coaching staff, Team 9 will not play any on-the-record games and will serve as a pool of potential players for the other eight teams to call up in the event of injury.[3] A similar system was reportedly used by NFL Europe.[3]

Many players in the Canadian Football League and Arena Football League (among other indoor American football leagues) later advance to the NFL, but no farming contracts exist among any teams, in part because the National Football League Players Association opposes the idea of an affiliated farm system on the grounds that its players would be at risk of unnecessary injury. During the mid-2000s, several NFL owners at least partially owned arena football teams, such as Jerry Jones (Dallas), Arthur Blank (Atlanta), Bud Adams (Tennessee), Tom Benson (New Orleans), and Pat Bowlen (Denver), but very rarely did they ever promote or demote any players between the AFL and NFL, due in part to significant differences in the playing schedules and the style of play between outdoor and indoor football. All of the NFL owners backed out of the league when it went bankrupt, was sold off and reorganized.

In Canada, intercollegiate sport has never attained a similar level of following compared to the United States, mainly due to ice hockey being the most popular sport in the country. In hockey, the National Hockey League has historically overlooked intercollegiate sport in favour of other player development models. Nevertheless, the Canadian Football League has established itself as a niche league despite collecting only a fraction of the revenues commanded by the NFL. To recruit talented players, the league to a large extent relies on maintaining rules that are similar enough to American football so as to allow talented NCAA-trained players a reasonable prospect of adapting and being successful in the CFL, while retaining significant enough differences so as to ensure that the league is largely not in competition with the NFL for exactly the same type of players. In addition, to maintain the league's distinct Canadian identity, the league enforces a strict quota of Canadian players that must be on the rosters of all CFL teams.

The Arena Football League had its own developmental league known as the af2 from 2000 to 2009.


Traditionally, the NBA did not have a formal farm league. It mainly relies on the elite NCAA to produce NBA players, and thus the latter was often known as the "feeders". Since 2001, the NBA directly owns an entire farm league: the NBA G League (formerly the NBA D-League). The NBA G League started with eight teams in the fall of 2001. In March 2005, NBA commissioner David Stern announced a plan to expand the league to fifteen teams and develop it into a true minor league farm system, with each team affiliated with one or more NBA teams. Although the system has been run for a few years, most of the rookies in NBA are still drafted out from NCAA. At the conclusion of the 2008–09 NBA season, 20 percent of NBA players had spent time in the NBA D-League. By the end of the 2016–17 season, 44% of players in the 2017 NBA playoffs had some experience in the D-League.[4] The league signed a branding agreement with Gatorade in 2017 to become the NBA G League.

Independent teams

Some sports allow the operation of independent feeder teams. In professional cycling, for example, feeder teams such as Vendée U and Trek Livestrong, act as feeders for Bouygues Télécom and Team RadioShack respectively, and compete at levels below the UCI ProTour. Most pro-cycling teams use this format.


In North American baseball, several independent leagues exist outside of the control of Minor League Baseball or Major League Baseball and without any formal developmental agreements, but may still exist as informal places for talent to develop.

Professional wrestling

Professional wrestling utilizes a farm system that allows inexperienced wrestlers to develop their skills and gain in ring experience in smaller, often regional promotions before they are called up to compete in front of a global/national audience. Generally called farm leagues or developmental territories, some of the more notable ones for WWE include World Wrestling Alliance (1998); Power Pro Wrestling (1998–2000); International Wrestling Association (1999–2001); Memphis Championship Wrestling (2000–2001); Deep South Wrestling (2005–2007), NXT (2007–present; formerly Florida Championship Wrestling); Heartland Wrestling Association (2001–2003), which was also a developmental territory for World Championship Wrestling; and Ohio Valley Wrestling (2000–2008 for WWE, 2011–2013 and 2019-present for the promotion now known as Impact Wrestling). In addition, smaller companies such as Ring of Honor and Impact Wrestling, or independent promotions such as Global Force Wrestling, Pro Wrestling Guerrilla, Combat Zone Wrestling, Chikara, and the now-defunct Extreme Championship Wrestling can act as unofficial feeder leagues, seasoning wrestlers until a larger company offers them a contract.

Formula One

Formula One teams often use the most promising drivers from divisions such as the current Formula Two championship, the former GP2 and Formula Two championships, with the majority of the current Formula Two's champions graduating to F1. Ten drivers on the grid for 2011 had previously raced in GP2. Scuderia Toro Rosso also serves as a sort of farm team for Red Bull Racing. Both are owned by Austrian beverage company Red Bull, with Toro Rosso helping to develop cars and drivers for Red Bull Racing. Four-time world champion Sebastian Vettel drove for Toro Rosso from 2007–2008 and made the move to Red Bull in 2009, replacing the retiring David Coulthard.


NASCAR, the principal body for stock car racing in North America, has an extensive system of developmental series, with the ultimate goal for drivers being a ride in the top-level Monster Energy Cup Series. Most Cup Series teams are involved in at least one of NASCAR's two other national series, either running vehicles in the junior series or affiliating with teams that run exclusively in those series:

  • The second-level Xfinity Series is the main proving ground for potential Cup drivers, crew chiefs, engineers, and pit crew members. Most races are run on the same weekends, and at the same tracks, as Cup Series races, and Xfinity cars are largely similar to Cup cars (though with some differences, most notably less powerful engines).
  • The third-level Camping World Truck Series is a pickup truck-based series. Most races are held in conjunction with Xfinity Series races, with many also serving as support events for Cup Series races. Relatively few drivers or engineers jump directly from the Truck Series to the Cup Series; most spend at least some time in the Xfinity Series first.



Indoor soccer

The Premier Arena Soccer League is a farm system for the Major Arena Soccer League.

See also


  1. ^ Kerrane, Kevin. "How Branch Rickey Invented Modern Baseball".
  2. ^ "MLS wants all its clubs either fielding reserve teams in USL PRO or affiliating with one by 2015".
  3. ^ a b Rachuk, Stephan (2019-04-24). "Oliver Luck talks TV deals, Draft and XFL's "Team 9" | XFL2k". Retrieved 2019-04-25.
  4. ^ "Alumni in the NBA: 44% Of Players on NBA Playoff Rosters Have NBA D-League Experience". NBA G League. April 17, 2017.
This page was last edited on 4 September 2019, at 16:21