Following the last international tournament of the year, the men’s baseball world rankings were updated earlier this week. Thanks to a second-place finish at the 21U Baseball World Cup in Taichung, Japan passed the United States for first place in the standings. The Czech Republic (5th in Taichung) made a big leap, moving up seven spots into the top 20. They are the fifth best team from Europe on the list behind the Netherlands (5th), Italy (11th), Spain (16th) and Germany (17th).
With the last international tournament in the books the lineup for the inaugural Premier 12 event in 2015 has been unofficially set. Japan, USA, Cuba, Chinese Taipei, Netherlands, Canada, Dominican Republic, Korea, Puerto Rico, Venezuela, Italy and Panama are the top 12 nations in the ranking. Mexico and Australia barely missed out on passing Panama in the 12th spot. But not all is lost for Mexico, as they square off against Panama on Wednesday.
According to the current men’s baseball world ranking page at www.ibaf.org the formula for the rankings will be updated with the beginning of 2015, which could lead to a different outlook.
Men’s Baseball World Ranking Top 30:
| Rank | Nation | Points |
2013 | Trending |
| 1 | Japan | 785.18 | 2 |  1 |
| 2 | USA | 766.02 | 1 |  1 |
| 3 | Cuba | 612.98 | 3 | — |
| 4 | Chinese Taipei | 605.48 | 4 | — |
| 5 | Netherlands | 433.50 | 6 | 1 |
| 6 | Canada | 353.52 | 7 | 1 |
| 7 | Dominican Republic | 349.18 | 5 | 2 |
| 8 | Korea | 340.90 | 8 | — |
| 9 | Puerto Rico | 276.50 | 9 | — |
| 10 | Venezuela | 261.00 | 10 | — |
| 11 | Italy | 196.18 | 11 | — |
| 12 | Panama | 128.42 | 13 | 1 |
| 13 | Australia | 127.82 | 14 | 1 |
| 14 | Mexico | 125.28 | 12 | 2 |
| 15 | Brazil | 116.61 | 15 | — |
| 16 | Spain | 105.52 | 17 | 1 |
| 17 | Germany | 78.90 | 19 | 2 |
| 18 | Nicaragua | 70.77 | 18 | — |
| 19 | Colombia | 69.00 | 16 | 3 |
| 20 | Czech Republic | 68.93 | 27 | 7 |
| 21 | China | 68.25 | 20 | 1 |
| 22 | Israel | 55.47 | 26 | 4 |
| 23 | Philippines | 52.40 | 23 | — |
| 24 | Pakistan | 51.00 | 21 | 3 |
| 25 | Great Britain | 50.56 | 24 | 1 |
| 26 | New Zealand | 50.00 | 28 | 2 |
| 27 | France | 46.75 | 32 | 5 |
| 28 | Argentina | 42.91 | 22 | 6 |
| 29 | South Africa | 33.00 | 31 | 2 |
| 30 | Thailand | 30.50 | 25 | 5 |