All About Olympic Baseball - Last Time as an Event?

The manager in international baseball is also allowed three visits to the mound to discuss situations with his pitcher. In North America, a manager has one "free" visit before he has to replace the pitcher.

If the manager decides to remove his pitcher from the game prior to using up his three trips to the mound, it does not count as one of his free visits. Should the games go into extra innings, one free visit by the manager is allowed for every three innings of play.

Since the Olympics consist of a 10-day tournament, the pitching rotation is a big issue for managers. Most major league teams use a five-man rotation with the club's ace starting on opening day. But in international play, the manager goes with a smaller rotation and uses pitchers more strategically.

In the Olympics, teams look at their draw before deciding on a rotation. For example, Canada may begin the tournament against a weaker team and play a more powerful nation during its second game. Manager Terry Puhl may then opt to save his best pitcher for the tougher contest, rather than staring him in the opening game.

The IOC meeting on 11th of July 2005 softball and baseball have been voted out of the 2012 London summer Olympics; the first sport to be voted out of the Olympics since 1936 in which Polo was eliminated.

The event will however remain on the docket for the Beijing Olympics 2008. The skills of 16 teams with excess of 300 athletes will be missing from the 2012 games. The two slots which were available after the International Olympic Committee's elimination of baseball have not been filled by any new sports which could see both softball and baseball re-emerging at the 2016 Olympic Games-- if no new sport is adopted on condition that softball and baseball garner enough numbers in votes to see inclusion

Cuba is by far the most successful baseball-nation of the world. The Cubans won the title 25 times at 36 world championships.

They also used the occasion of the sport's introduction at the Olympic Games 1992 to set an example at the first baseball-competition in the history of the Olympic Games. In the tournaments final the Cubans defeated Taiwan with 11 runs to 1. They continued their success by winning the gold medal at the Olympic Games in Atlanta 1996 and in Athens 2004. However, in 2000 in Sydney the Cuban team lost the final against the USA and thus had to be content with silver.

Olympic format

Only eight teams, playing in a round robin followed by semi-finals. Since 2000 players have not been required to be amateur.The rules are basically the same as club baseball. For some reason there is no women's event.

Olympic qualifying

For Beijing, alongside the hosts, the Americas will have two places, while Europe and Asia have one each. These go to the winners of the respective continental championships, with the final three places up for grabs at a world tournament.

Olympic history

Baseball returned as an Olympic sport in 1992, but will be axed, along with Softball after Beijing. That's a real shame for Cuba, who have won three of the last four.

Who's the best?

Since professional players were allowed in 2000, you'd expect the USA to have wiped the floor with the rest. In fact, while they took gold in Sydney 2000, they didn't even qualify for Athens 2004 after losing to Mexico in the qualifying tournament. However, they won the Americas tournament in 2006, and so are qualified for Beijing. Cuba, the runners-up, also qualified.