Minor league players take 7 hour, $683 Uber

DJ Peterson and three other minor league baseball players had to take a seven hour, $683.52 Uber ride in order to catch a flight to their next game.

Minor league baseball players have to do things the hard way sometimes. Whether it’s training on their own or working part time, they’ll do whatever it takes in the hopes that someday they can make it up to the majors.

Seattle Mariners minor leaguer DJ Peterson knows about doing things the hard way. In order to make it to the team’s next game, he and three of his teammates tried to book an American Airlines flight from Phoenix to Albuquerque. Somehow that didn’t work out, and instead they had to take a $683 Uber ride to New Mexico at 3 a.m. DJ Peterson shared some of the details of their odyssey on Twitter

A couple of the hashtags catch the eye. “Be better” and “have better customer service,” obviously directed at American Airlines, indicate that the third baseman blames the airline for his impromptu road trip. No details have emerged to indicate exactly what American Air did wrong.

An athlete using an Uber for a long journey isn’t unheard of.  Shareece Wright paid $932 to take an Uber from Chicago to Buffalo. While that story had a fun, feel-good vibe to it, the journey of the minor leaguers feels different.

Mostly, that’s because Wright’s ride was in order to attend a voluntary workout, while this ride was in the middle of the season, just before a game. Just because they’re minor leaguers doesn’t mean they’re not professional. Each of these guys has a lot riding on their performance each week. A string of good games can mean getting called up. A few bad games can result in a player getting sent farther down the team’s minor league system.

Next: White Sox call up Yoan Moncada

Ultimately, though, this is just a story of a bunch of guys doing what it takes to try and make their major league dreams come true.