12/21/24
September 27, 2009
U.S. Wins Baseball World Cup Over Cuba: The United States defeated Cuba 10-5 today in the final of the Baseball World Cup, a 71-year-old competition that's little known even among baseball fans. The event was limited to amateurs until 1996 and minor leaguers are playing in it today, but Major League Baseball still bars its players from the event. The World Cup has been hoisted by the U.S. four times, Venezuela three, Colombia two, and Cuba 25 times. The Americans were led by Texas Rangers prospect Justin Smoak, with 9 home runs and 21 RBIs, and the pitching of Chicago White Sox prospect Lucas Harrell.
I did, and Canada finished third !
posted by tommybiden at 02:07 PM on September 27, 2009
Show of hands: Who knew baseball had its own World Cup?
Not me
posted by Ying Yang Mafia at 04:41 PM on September 27, 2009
I claim fifth!
posted by owlhouse at 05:27 PM on September 27, 2009
I didn't know it either. Shame on me!
Pass that fifth will ya, owlhouse.
posted by Howard_T at 01:56 PM on September 28, 2009
No wonder no one's ever heard of it. According to the wikipedia page for the Baseball World Cup, they can't even decide how often they want to play it. Years between consecutive tournaments counting backward from this one are as follows: 2, 2, 2, 2, 3, 4, 4, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2, 1, <1 (somehow they played it twice in 1973), 1, 1, 1, 1, 4, 4, 8, 1, 1, 1, 2, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1 Between that ridiculous schedule and the fact that they play during the MLB season but do not have MLB players, there's no surprise that this slides by unnoticed every time they scrape it together. In fact, rcade, how did you even find out about this in the first place?
By the way, I do think it's kind of cool that one of the countries in each group hosted it's group's play, and then they ones who moved on played the next round in the Netherlands before playing the final round in Italy. That may not be conducive to spectators attending the event if they weren't already in those locations, but it is an interesting concept for a tournament--I suppose it's kind of like the college baseball playoffs/World Series, but on an international scale.
posted by bender at 03:11 PM on September 28, 2009
I found out about it on a news site Sunday and caught the final two innings of the final on the MLB Network. The event definitely needs to be played on a regular schedule, and it appears that it's settled into an every-other-year format.
There's no word on when the next one will be held, but the president of the IBAF has a blog.
posted by rcade at 07:39 PM on September 28, 2009
Show of hands: Who knew baseball had its own World Cup?