Best of SI: MLB Agent Scott Boras Started as a Failed Minor Leaguer

Before Scott Boras ruled baseball, he was a 24-year-old second baseman in Double A, and he was fast asleep. A knock on his hotel room door awoke him around 6 a.m. “Boras!” rumbled Cardinals minor league field coordinator George Kissell. “Get up!”

Boras’s mind raced. He was scorching the ball for the Arkansas Travelers. He had just come off a two-hit night. He was imagining his call-up by the time he turned the knob.

“Put some clothes on,” Kissell said. “We’re going to church.”

“George,” Boras pointed out, “it’s Tuesday.”

“I know,” Kissell said. “But I saw you play defense last night, and we’re going to church and praying that this workout’s gonna make you better defensively.”

There were better players throughout the minor leagues. But none of them would have as much of an impact on the sport as the guy who couldn’t field, didn’t hit for power and would never make the majors.

This winter alone, the Boras Corporation cleared more than $1 billion in contracts. That minor league second baseman has become the most prominent agent in sports.

These days, he is as consumed by the coronavirus pandemic as the rest of us. Even without games, he keeps himself—as is often the case—at the center of the baseball world. In March, he submitted to MLB a suggestion of a new postseason structure. Last week, he wrote a New York Times op-ed.

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