Why Americans Ignore the World Baseball Classic

While watching the Canada vs. USA match this Saturday morning it occurred to me that 40,000 Canadians in a dome in Toronto are there out of national pride and to see if their team can beat the Americans.

And this comes at a time when their beloved hockey season is heading towards the playoffs.

Wherever our team goes they are the ones who others want to beat into submission. The USA team might as well be the Yankees.

And that's the key. Rightly or wrongly we don't feel like we exist in the shadow of a more powerful country in sports or in other endeavors for that matter. Thus, we don't look for times like these to prove what we are made of.

We are convinced our team sports athletes are far superior to international baseball, basketball or football leagues Stars from around the world play in our leagues whereas Americans go abroad when they can't make it in the NFL, MLB or the NBA.

Sprinkled throughout the WBC international teams are players who we root for when they don uniforms of the Mariners, Red Sox and Angels.

It seems odd for us to turn around and hate on them because they are now wearing the colors of Japan, the Dominican or even Canada.

It's not that we have no national pride. That is clear when you see the size of audiences for the Olympic games. But in general, most of the Olympic sports that consume us are individual in nature. And in many of those sports we are the underdog, living in the shadow of dominant teams from countries around the world.

We also are given the opportunity to get to know our Olympic athletes and feel connected to their personal stories. Some of that is a creature of the television networks who need to make us care to justify the hundreds of millions they spend on the rights to broadcast the games.

But since we know the MLB players who play on Team USA no introductions seem necessary. It's just not life or death for us and we don't think we have a point to prove.

This isn't the Olympic men's basketball team needing redemption. But it is baseball and despite some of the quirky rules that irk us, it isn't a waste of time.

Just one woman's thoughts. I'm sure you have yours.

Comments

[dstanley]

People probably aren't watching because they don't know it exists. It's only been around a short time, and I didn't even know about it last time it was played.

I think the belief that Americans are raving xenophobes isn't true. Americans aren't any more xenophobic than anyone else. Actually, the American entertainment industry is relentlessly protectionist at home and obsessed with free trade abroad. It covers up this contradiction by insisting that Americans don't want foreign entertainment (when have we ever gotten the opportunity?)

[aftershock]

Ummm... or maybe Americans just don't care for baseball all that much anymore? The younger generations have been brought up on basketball and football, and now soccer and lacrosse. Baseball is just...wel­l old. It's a slow game in a society that demands speed and action.

[RoseMerry]

I gave on baseball when the All-Star games was declared a tie. A fracking tie. There are no ties in baseball!!!!

[RobinSeattle]

There are in Japan. Still sucks, though.

[drumz]

I love the WBC! It's a showcase for talent. I want other countries to get better at baseball because I love the game and I want them to have the success we have. You get to see young players and how they perform on the world stage.

[Javani]

I will be rooting for the Netherlands to crush Puerto Rico tonight and thereby inflict another humiliating defeat on the North American-C­aribbean-E­ast Asian Baseball Axis.

[drumz]

Not if Ponson is on the mound...

[grailknight]

World Baseball Classic, since 2006, truly a time honored event.

[thebeerdoctor]

The World Baseball Classic is a global, players' tournament. If it reveals that United States baseball consists of the talented contributions from players everywhere, so be it. Cultural exchange is an honorable human activity. For those who scream Who Cares? That is your choice to ignore it. To demand that others adhere to your vision of this game is wrong. There is something about people in the United States (not all) who grow uncomfortably xenophobic at the use of the word "world"; whether it is the World Cup, the World Court, or the World Baseball Classic.

[TimDanMick]

When a European Soccer team has a bad season and they finish at the bottom of the top league they are relegated to the league below. Their failure is abject, their income drops to maybe 20% of what it was. It is all about competition.

In American sports if you finish at the bottom you get first pick of incoming players who are packaged out like frozen peas. It is all about franchises and monopolies.
The US has total control of the administration of professional boxing. QED.

Outside of Sport the best example is Microsoft. Its success is only due to its monopolistic market position. The only good products it has it bought when they had been developed elsewhere.

What the US needs is real, fair competition. Let failures fail. Do not bail out companies or teams who do not succeed.

[tailgateshirts]

USA did pretty good last night, pulling out the mercy rule!

[Gunga-Din]

It is only fear.Baseb­all nowadays is a asian-caribeann game. The USA cant win .

[drumz]

Man, you're even ignorant about baseball too. no surprise. How many Americans are on other countries teams? It is an American game and though there are players from other countries the majority of big league rosters are Americans. I guess in your world anyone not white is a foreigner.

[drumz]

SOme stats for you:
In the 2005 MLB season 59.9 percent of the players were white, 8.5 percent were African-
American, 28.7 percent were Latino and 2.5 percent were of Asian descent. This was a three-
percentage point decrease for white players and three-percentage point increase for Latinos.
The percentage of African-American players is the lowest it has been in 26 years. There were
30 Asian baseball players in the entire league, which is four more than last season. The
percentage of international players in MLB was 30.3 percent, up three percentage points.
According to the MLB, players born outside of the 50 United States represent 27.4% of those
surveyed on the 2006 Opening Day rosters of Major League Baseball.
Source: http://www.baseballmusings.com/archives/cat_demographics.php

[drumz]

Pasted wrong sours: http://209.85.173.132/search?q=cache:Pzwf5puIdsEJ:www.bus.ucf.edu/sport/public/downloads/2005_Racial_Gender_Report_Card_MLB.pdf+MLB+players+ethnic+breakdown&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=4&gl=us&client=firefox-a

[RobinSeattle]

"it occurred to me that 40,000 Canadians in a dome in Toronto are there out of national pride and to see if their team can beat the Americans.­"

So you can read minds of Canadian baseball fans from your house?

I've been watching the WBC and have enjoyed it so far. China upset Taiwan to send the latter team packing even though there are little leagues that play more games than the Chinese pro league and Holland beat the mighty Dominican Republic.

You cite the fact that most of the WBC players are on MLB clubs during that organization's regular season, but that is not only not true of the Korean and Japanese teams, the whole "no new stories" meme is a non-issue anyway.

The main problem with the WBC is when it takes place. It is still spring training and the WBC participants are not in peak shape. It also has to compete with March Madness. So it is kind of jarring to a lot of fans to be having a serious baseball tournament this time of year. There are also questions as to how this affects the credibility of the now so-called World Series after last year's faceoff between Philadelphia and Tampa Bay laid a big ratings egg.

[NCRDIBULL]

Paula, we ignore it because its not relevant ... this time of year is for spring training , exhibition baseball..­. Basically , World Baseball Classic is a Who gives a ... event....

[oxi]

Just for your information Canadiens are Americans! Canada is part of North America, thus they are just as American as Cubans are!

[SamEllison]

In baseball the word hate is relative.

In the rest of the world this tournament would be called a friendly.
Why not in baseball?

I'm watching something like my fifth game of the series right now.
And loving it, cabin fever ya know.