With the conclusion of the Olympics, baseball on the world stage only needs to wait till March for the next big tournament. In 2009, the World Baseball Classic will return for the second time. Although there was much criticism from purists, the Classic turned out to be a huge success. And while American players did not show much enthusiasm at the outset, by the end of the tournament, the players were really into it.
In case you are not familiar with the World Baseball Classic, the idea was developed by Major League Baseball for the purpose of growing the game globally. Foreign countries have developed baseball programs and have spurred interest among their country’s athletes. As it was in 2006, there will be 16 nations competing in next spring’s Classic. That will likely grow to 24 teams in the years to come.
There will be some changes in the tournament next year. Like the first tournament, sixteen teams will be divided into 4 separate pools in the first round. The first round will be played from March 5th through the 12th. Pool A will take place in Tokyo and be made up of clubs from China, Chinese Taipei, Japan, and Korea. Pool B is made up of
What is different for next year is the first two rounds will be a double elimination instead of the round robin format used in 2006. This will eliminate the unruly tie breaker scenarios that occurred in the last Classic.
Six games will be played within each pool. The two teams that remain standing after the 5thgame will play each other to determine who the winner and runner up team is within the Pool. The winner and runner up from each of the pools will move on to the second round.
Pool A and Pool B’s winners will form Pool 1 in the second round and Pool C and Pool D will form Pool 2 in the second round. The same double elimination format will be used in the second round with each of the two pools determining a winner and a runner up. Pool 1’s games will be played in
The second change to be made is in the semi-finals. The winner of Pool 1 and 2 will play the runner up teams from the opposite pools. In 2006, the top two winners in each pool of round 2 played each other in the semi-finals. The semi-finals will be single elimination. The winner of each semi-final game will play each other in a one game final with the winner crowned the champion of the World Baseball Classic. Both the semi-finals and the finals will be played at Dodger Stadium in
Major League players may play on teams of other countries if they are of ethnic background. In 2006, Mike Piazza played for
Next spring, the spring training camps will be open longer to help players get ready for the season. This will force the regular season to start later and if the World Series of 2009 were to go seven games, it would end on November 5th, the latest in history.
Regardless of the arguments against, there are too many positives that could derail the Classic. Following next year, the Classic will be played every four years. The hope is that it will someday be as big as the World Cup in Soccer and that ballplayers from other countries will grow to be fodder for the Major Leagues who are always looking for repositories of new talent.
