Tag Archives: European baseball

Big Friday for British baseball teams in Europe

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The CEB (Confederation of European Baseball) tournament website is a little dated, but it doesn’t matter what the graphics look like when they’re showing a victory for a British baseball team.

Just a few minutes ago, this was the site on the live feed from Stockholm:

(N.B. ignore the 10 inning reference, it automatically goes to the next inning after the previous one – such as the ninth – ends).

The London Mets secured a 7-0 victory over UKS Deby Osielsko to give themselves a chance to make it through to the Federations Cup Qualifier Pool 3 final.

Their final group game takes place at 11.00 GMT tomorrow (Friday) and it’s going to be a tough one against the Pool favourites, Sant Boi. The Spanish team are 3-0 and already guaranteed a place in the final, which might mean they take their eye off the ball. If they do, the Mets are sure to be ready to take advantage. London’s victory tonight means they are 2-1 in the Pool knowing a win on Friday will be enough to get a final berth.

If Sant Boi come out on top, that would probably result in a three-way tie for second place with Kaunas County B.C. (who are 2-2) and the hosts Stockholm who are 1-2 and strong favourites to beat UKS Deby tomorrow to even up their record. CEB tournament rules mean that the first tie-breaker (result against the other tied team) won’t separate the teams (they are all 1-1 in games against each other) so it moves on to the second tie-breaker: Teams Quality Balance (TQB). As explained in the rules:

“*Teams Quality Balance (TQB) is the sum of runs scored divided by the number of innings played on offense minus the number of runs allowed divided by the number of innings played on defense. (RS/IPO) – (RA/IPD)=TQB.

The TQB is calculated with four decimal places. The fifth decimal place is used to round up or down”.

Here is how things stand with Kaunas having played their four games, and London and Stockholm still to play their final games tomorrow.

GP RS OIP RS/OIP RA DIP RA/DIP TQB
London 3 20 26 0.769230769 6 26 0.230769231 0.5385
Kaunas 4 25 33 0.757575758 13 32 0.40625 0.3513
Stockholm 3 5 23 0.217391304 27 23 1.173913043 -0.9565

* This is my quick calculation, not an official tally (i.e. subject to error!).

If I’ve calculated that all correctly, at this stage the Mets are in the cat-bird seat; however the key difference is that the other two teams have already played the strongest team in the Pool.  Kaunas lost 8-0 to Sant Boi earlier today, whilst Stockholm lost 11-3 to them in their pool opener. So, if the Mets can’t quite get the better of Sant Boi tomorrow, they’ll need to work hard to keep the score close to stay ahead of Kanuas.

Southampton’s semi-final

It was a good day for the Southampton Mustangs too, competing in Pool B in Serbia. They defeated Atletico Alexandria 13-7 to make it two wins on the spin after losing their opener against pool favourites Diving Ducks W.Neustadt from Austria.

That victory sets up what is effectively a semi-final on Friday (15.00 GMT) against the home team Beograd ’96. Both teams have a 2-1 record and whoever wins the game will go on to face the Diving Ducks on Saturday. The Ducks are 3-0 and guaranteed a place in the final even if they lose against Athletic Sofia tomorrow lunchtime.

The Mustangs, reigning NBL champions, made it to their pool final last year where they were beaten by Sant Boi.

British baseball fans would really get that ‘Friday feeling’ if we end up with two teams in the final, with the Mets getting some British revenge on the Spanish team in the process.

You can follow the action live on the CEB website, with updates on their Twitter accounts (@LondonMets and @SotonMustangs) as well.

Prospects looking good

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We’re at the point in the off-season when all the major signings have been completed and yet we’re still a few weeks away from players reporting to their respective Spring Training camps.

That makes it a good time to check up on some of the best young players in the Minor Leagues.

MLB.com only paid a passing interest in prospects until a few years ago when Jonathan Mayo was joined by Jim Callis on the site and they started to make a feature of the MLBPipeline section.

They’ve just announced their latest prospect rankings, listing the top 100 young players still with rookie eligibility alongside other breakdowns such as the top 10 prospects at every position and top 30 rankings for every team (the latter to be published soon).

There’s lots of great information to learn from and it’s really well presented, so it’s an excellent resource to tap into. The only minor criticism I have is that they don’t state the level of play in the stat lines for the players (you have to know which league the abbreviation refers to and what level of play that is, High-A, Double-A etc), which would be helpful to have at a glance rather than needing to read through the player comments in full first up every time.

There are other great sources of information out there (the prospect coverage on BaseballProspectus – subscription usually required for the prospect articles - and Fangraphs, MinorLeagueBall.com, Keith Law’s Insider work on ESPN.com – again requiring a subscription etc), but MLBPipeline is by far the most accessible and user-friendly prospect resource and is the place I’d recommend all baseball fans start at when wanting to learn about the young players in the Minor Leagues.

Here are a few initial thoughts from the top 100 rankings.

Those with the biggest pockets still value prospects

The Los Angeles Dodgers have had a strange off-season, but the fact that they have two of the top four prospects (Corey Seager at #1, Julio Urias at #4) is instructive on why they have tended to spend their money on shorter ‘win now’ deals rather than longer-term commitments this winter.

The ‘luxury tax’ on high-revenue teams means that it still makes sense to develop a core group of talented ‘homegrown’ players and then use their financial clout to add extra specific pieces to the puzzle and to sign the young players to contract extensions a few years down the line. We’ve seen Boston take that approach with prospect graduates Xander Bogaerts and Mookie Betts and the New York Yankees’ out-of-character shyness on the free agency market this off-season is also part of a plan for them to get younger over the next year or so and then spend money on free agents in future.

Texas keep on producing prospects 

The Texas Rangers have had one of the most celebrated farm systems over the past five years or so and their ability to keep re-stocking their ranks from the draft, international signings and picking up prospects from other teams is impressive.

The likes of Rougned Odor and Delino Deshields Jr (the latter picked up from Houston a year ago) played key roles in the Rangers’ charge to the AL West title in 2015, as did the trade for ace pitcher Cole Hamels that was made possible by them having a deep system from which to trade from.

The Rangers have five players in the MLBPipeline top 100 and they ranked top in the ‘Prospect Point’ list, all despite trading away three top 100 prospects to get Hamels.

Phillies rebuild taking shape

The Philadelphia Phillies finally bit the bullet and started a rebuild and that’s given them more prospects in the top 100 (7) than any other team, three of which were the players acquired in the Hamels trade.

The Major League team might not be much fun in the present, but the future does now look bright after a couple of years of directionless dithering.

The next golden era of shortstops?

The Houston Astros’ Carlos Correa and the Cleveland Indians’ Francisco Lindor both took to the Major League with aplomb in 2015 and immediately became two of the best shortstops around.

MLBPipeline’s number one prospect Corey Seager also impressed after making his debut in September for the Dodgers, especially when it came to his fielding. He’s one of six potential shortstops in their top 12 and, as with several of the others, questions remain as to whether he will remain at that position or move to third base.

Seager showed enough promise during his initial Major League appearances to suggest he can stick at the position for a while yet, and if so then we could be witnessing the next great shortstop era since the Derek Jeter, Alex Rodriguez and Nomar Garciaparra era of the early 2000’s.

Max Kepler – flying the European flag

Finally, we can’t overlook the one European player on the list. Kepler comes in at number 44 and he made his Major League debut on 27 September last year for the Minnesota Twins.

The German has been pegged as the best European prospect in years since signing a $800k bonus with the Twins back in 2009 and slowly but surely he has developed his game while climbing up the Minor League levels.

Kepler turns 23 on 10 February and hopefully he will keep improving and earn a regular spot on the Twins’ Major League roster as the 2016 season progresses.

Is MLB heading to London in 2016?

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Sadly the lack of TV and radio coverage of MLB in the UK this past season meant that we didn’t hear much from ace broadcaster Josh Chetwynd. However, with one off-season tweet he was able to create plenty of excitement among British baseball fans.

The pessimist in me worried that it might be too good to be true, but Matt Crawshaw quickly allayed those fears with confirmation that #MLBLondon is a definite possibility.

In response to the news, I’ve written a blog for the Huffington Post going into a bit more detail about a potential visit to London by MLB, following up on the tremendous success experienced by the NFL on these shores.

The Netherlands and Italy have been the two countries most frequently touted as a potential European destination for MLB and they are likely still the frontrunners. A trip to London in 2016 is only a possibility, but it’s wonderful news nonetheless as it reinforces previous reports that MLB is serious about coming over to Europe.

I don’t need to explain to anybody visiting this website just how exciting it would be to have MLB games played in London. And if the worst case scenario is a road trip to the Netherlands instead, count me in!

Eurosport to show Spain’s WBC games

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Update: as per the comments below, it looks like the published schedule may not be correct and these games are only available on International Eurosport, not Eurosport UK. Hopefully we’ll get clarification soon

Baseball fans in the U.K. will have two TV channels on which to watch games from the forthcoming World Baseball Classic (WBC), with Eurosport joining ESPN America in offering live baseball from the premier international tournament.

ESPN America, as the home of MLB in the UK and throughout Europe, was the natural host for the WBC and they’ve already confirmed that they will be showing games from the event.

However, the news that Eurosport are also broadcasting some games as well is a real bonus.

The channel has shown baseball games in the past, from European Baseball Championship games to the World Cup, so there was always a hope that they might get involved.

Their online UK TV guide shows that they are broadcasting games on Friday 8, Saturday 9 and Sunday 10 March and a quick check of the WBC schedule reveals that Eurosport will be following the fortunes of Spain in these contests.

The Spanish national team will compete at the WBC for the first time in the third staging of the event after coming through a qualifying competition in September. Spain will join the traditional powerhouses of Italy and the Netherlands in representing European baseball at the tournament.

They face a very difficult task in emerging from their First Round group as they are up against Puerto Rico, the Dominican Republic and Venezuela, all of whom have several MLB All-Stars on their rosters. However, it will be a great challenge to compete against the likes of Yadier Molina, Carlos Beltran, Robinson Cano, Jose Reyes, Hanley Ramirez, Pablo Sandoval and Miguel Cabrera.

Details on MLB.com’s online coverage of the WBC are still to be announced. It is expected that a subscription package for the event, separate from the main 2013 MLB.TV Premium subscription, will be available to sign up to in the next couple of days.

Dutch outfielder Greg Halman killed

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There is tragic news coming out of the Netherlands today. Greg Halman, the Seattle Mariners and Netherlands outfielder, reportedly has been killed in an incident in Rotterdam.

Full details are not yet known, but reports state that he was fatally stabbed.

Halman’s Major League debut came on 23 September 2010 and, as I wrote about at the time, it was a memorable game.  Although Halman went 0-for-4, his teammate Ichiro set a Major League record by notching his 200th hit of the season for the tenth consecutive time.  Additionally, Jose Bautista hit his 50th home run of the season in the same game.

I noted that “Bautista has now hit the fifty mark once and that alone puts him in the record books.  Maybe someday Greg Halman will earn a mention in there too”.

Sadly he will never get the chance.

It is a sad day for all European baseball fans.  Halman’s achievement at making it all the way to the Major Leagues was celebrated by many and it is a dreadful shame that he will never be able to fulfill his potential, both in baseball and in life in general.

Netherlands win the Baseball World Cup

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bwc2011The Netherlands Senior baseball team has turned what was already a positive year for European baseball into a great one.

In the early hours of Sunday morning European time, the Netherlands defeated Cuba 2-1 in Panama to win the Baseball World Cup for the first time. 

Technically this is the second time a European team has won the event, as the records show that the inaugural staging of it in 1938 was won by Great Britain. 

However, and without wishing to downplay the achievement of that team, the 1938 version was simply a series between Great Britain (actually England) and a U.S. Olympic team. 

The England team won the series 4-1 and the International Baseball Federation decided to crown the team as the first World Amateur Champions after the event, as explained in the excellent ‘History of the Great Britain Team’ available as a pdf on the Project COBB website.

The Netherlands’ triumph is therefore the first time that a European team has won the World Cup in its format as a truly international competition.  Continue reading →

MLB could be heading to Europe in 2014

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MlbHlSqSome Major League Baseball games could be played on European soil in the near future.

Dutch baseball journalist Pim van Nes has written a very interesting news story on Mister-Baseball.com about a press conference held in the Netherlands on Monday.  A new ballpark is being built for the Vaessen Pioniers in Hoofddorp and the plan is for its capacity to be increased temporarily to 30,000 for the staging of three MLB games in 2014.

The Netherlands are one of three European countries putting together proposals to bring MLB to Europe.  Italy and Germany are proposing to use ballparks in Rome and Regensburg respectively.  The Netherlands’ bid will be officially presented to MLB at this year’s All-Star Game in Arizona.

MLB has already shown itself to be keen to expand further into new territories, not least in playing two regular season games in Japan in 2008.  Continue reading →

Team GB to take a Tel Aviv tour to qualify for the 2012 European Championships

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Team GBIf you missed the news on Twitter, first reported by Mister-Baseball.com, the Great Britain Senior National Team now know what route they need to take to qualify for the 2012 European Baseball Championship.

Team GB will head to Tel Aviv, Israel, at the end of July for a four-team tournament including the host nation, Lithuania and Georgia.

The many Brits who think of baseball as ‘that rounders game played by Americans’ would scarcely believe such an event could take place. 

Finding out that Great Britain has a team is often a surprise in itself.  Adding Israel, Lithuania and Georgia into the baseball mix would leave people doubting your sanity, but it’s a great example of the varied and diverse baseball culture that, unknowingly to many, exists in Europe.

The news story on the official Great Britain website provides some additional details, for instance noting the respective IBAF world rankings of the four teams.  They would lead you to believe that Great Britain should qualify comfortably.  Certainly they will go into it as favourites and should be confident of progressing, but new Head Coach Sam Dempster will know that taking any baseball team lightly is the first step towards a humbling defeat. 

I’ve no doubt that Dempster and General Manager Jason Greenberg will have the team well-prepared for the trip and to re-start the national team’s rise after a disappointing 2010 campaign.

The final paragraph in the Great Britain story also raises the possibility that the games might be streamed live on the internet.  Tel Aviv’s time zone is two hours ahead of British Summer Time so we could be able to follow the games at a convenient hour.

Mister Baseball’s European Top 50

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Mister Baseball’s European Top 50 rankings have been updated following the completion of the 2010 domestic seasons throughout Europe.

The rankings are produced by BBC Five Live Sports Extra presenter Josh Chetwynd.  Josh, of course, is a former Great Britain player and British baseball league veteran and his detailed ranking system is now in its fourth year. 

The 2010 National Baseball League champions, the Richmond Flames, are British baseball’s highest entrant at number 30, with Bracknell Blazers following in at 32.  The British pair are separated by MGPU S.Y.O.S. Moscow, which goes to show just how wide-ranging the rankings are.

Comparing teams over different leagues of varying standards is not an exact science and that’s fully acknowledged each time the revised rankings are published:

“The combination of country strength and individual team performance is intended to give a snapshot of European club play for a single year. These rankings do not attempt to offer a historic comparison of clubs and do not assert that a team ranked higher than another is a “better” team. Rather, a combination of performance and league strength reflects the ordering. We recognize that these rankings stir debate. In part, that’s their very purpose. We do not claim this list to be definitive”.

These rankings are always a fascinating read and are a great way to introduce MLB fans to the top teams in European baseball.  Well worth taking a look at.

Web pick of the week: Josh Chetwynd on Planet Hardball

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Web-PickThis week’s web pick sees the return of a familiar face, or at least the return of a familiar voice, to British baseball fans.  Josh Chetywnd was part of the excellent team that brought us ‘Baseball on Five’, which continues to be greatly missed.  Sadly, MLB’s return to terrestrial TV in the UK doesn’t appear to be imminent and Josh would play a minimal part in the coverage in any case as he has now returned to the States with his family.

However, Josh’s interest in European baseball, fuelled by his time in British baseball (with the national team and in the domestic leagues) and a season with a semi-pro team in Sweden, has not diminished.  He created a system to rank European club teams several years ago and he publishes the rankings at Mister-Baseball.com, refining the system each year.  Josh was invited on to the latest episode of the Planet Hardball podcast to talk about the 2009 season rankings, passing on lots of useful information about the state of baseball in Europe in the process.

You can get to the podcast via the relevant blog post on Planet Hardball.  Incidentally, this is a relatively new website “dedicated to raising awareness of baseball being played around the world”.  Definitely one to add to your bookmarks or RSS feed reader.