Maury Brown of Biz of Baseball did an interview with IBAF president Dr. Harvey Schiller to talk about Baseball and the Olympics.
An excerpt:
Maury Brown for the Business of Sports Network: You, as well as Bob DuPuy, Donald Fehr, John Ostermeyer and others made your case for the reinstatement of baseball into the 2016 Olympics. How would you describe presentation to the IOC?
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Dr. Harvey Schiller: It went very well and was very well received. The sport has addressed every issue as to why the game was removed from the program, and also presented a very extensive plan where for the next seven years we will work on marketing partnerships with the IOC to grow, both baseball and the Olympic programme.
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If baseball is not included it will be the world’s largest sport not in the Olympics.
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Bizball: As part of the presentation, the group has said it will offer a five-day, eight team tournament which will allow maximum participation of the top players from the countries that qualify for the 2016 Olympic Games. The qualifier for 2016 would be held during the 2015 off-season. The reference was “top players” but not “MLB players”. With the Olympics occurring in the middle of the major league season, how difficult will it be to get premiere players from the league to participate in the Olympics?
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Schiller: I think that’s semantics. Don Fehr and Bob DuPuy both addressed the issue; top players include MLB players, of course. The real issue is the interest in American players. Remember, in Beijing, Team Japan was also professional players; Korea was all professional players; Team Cuba was all professional players, and Team USA had players off the 40 man roster. Japan could have asked for players playing in MLB and chose not to for nationalistic reasons, and may do so again. The five day plan allows for maximum flexibility for a sampling of top players, depending on who qualifies, and I think the way the world is now it is very difficult to predict who those eight teams will be. Many forget that the US, with an All-Star pitcher at the time in Roger Clemens, lost to Mexico and did not qualify for the Athens games.
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We also know baseball is a game of team chemistry, and it will be up to the federation and the manger to decide who best makes up that team. Will it be All-Stars or the right mix? Too hard to say. However, we do know this: there is more interest in players playing international games for their countries now than ever before, and a five day tournament – where MLB has already said they will not play on Gold Medal day and many teams could have another off day – gives players the best chance to play if they so desire.