Our friends at Baseball.it reported already back in December of last year that newly elected IBAF President Riccardo Fraccari is planning to bring MLB opening day or at least spring training games to Italy. On Wednesday the Associated Press had some more information on the topic.
According to the report MLB officials, including James Pearce, Clive Russell and Dan Bonanno recently scouted the ballparks in Nettuno, Parma, Palermo and Messina as potential spring training sites. MLB explores the idea of sending a pair of teams to Italy as early as 2011, 2012 or 2014. However talks are still in the early stages.