Beijing - With the fanfare of an All star event MLB announced the exhibition series between the Dodgers and Padres on March 15-16. Joe Torre And Dave Winfield shared sometime with a few local kids and talked about the growing game of baseball in a country that understands baseball like USA understands cricket  Also seeing Joe Torre in something other than pin stripes was unique.  Pretty cool event!

Now the fun part..getting the field ready for a March baseball series. Even though it was 9 degrees outside with a wind chill of -2 there was a lot of people talking baseball. The weather here mirrors New York city so March could be a great day for weather or a pretty yucky day.  The field itself should be OK as we had a great test event this past august in preparation for the 2008 Olympic Games. The press conference had a real international feel to it with a number of journalists from other parts of Asia such as Singapore, Thailand, Bangkok, Vietnam, Korea etc..  We (Bob Watson MLB, Phil Bradley MLBPA and Paul Seiler USA Baseball) arrived the day before to attend planning meetings and to inspect ongoing improvements to the field.  The field is dormant and as you can see our entourage was a bit chilly to say the least as we reviewed both fields and stadium improvements.  At least it wasn't smoggy!  Stay tuned for turf updates. Under the black cover the Bermuda shoots are actually green which is a good thing as most turf professionals felt the 419 Bermuda would not make it through the winter.  Its still a little early but we are crossing our fingers it makes it through the winter so we do not have to plant the entire field next spring. Even some of the PHD winter Rye grass has remained green.   

Over the past few days the International BAseball Federation's ( IBAF) steering committee met to discuss the future of the games worldwide. IBAF represents the worlds governing body as it relates to International development of the game of baseball. Every country has there own federation of sport. In order for a country to host a regulation international baseball event IBAF must sanction the program.  Most importantly IBAF is responsible for baseball in the Olympics an with a new President ( Dr. Harvey Schiller (USA) and general Secretary John Ostermeyer (AUS) at the helm there is new breeze blowing that will guide us back into the Olympics for 2016. 

It is amazing to meet with many of the people around the world that share a similar passion for baseball. At this steering committee meeting we had members from around the world present including Cuba, Mexico, Australia, Italy, Great Britain , Spain, Switzerland and Canada.  There are so many levels of baseball world wide and the growth of the game internationally in the past 5 years has grown rapidly.    The next IBAF tournament will be in Taiwan. It is a Pre Olympic Qaulifier where the top three teams get a free ticket to the Olympics in Beijing.  USA, Cuba, Netherlands, Japan and China have already qualified on the Olympic games. http://www.baseball.ch/

The 2007 Year will be a tough one to top as it relates to exciting Internationals  baseball tournaments.  The USA baseball complex in Cary Opened with great fanfare and the fields turned out great.  Hats off to Jimmy Walters and his crew at the Town of Cary !  Check out Team USA's website for up todate info on plans for the team and all the GOLD they won in 2007!  It was an Impressive year.  http://mlb.mlb.com/usa_baseball/index.jsp