On Saturday the Italian Baseball and Softball Federation (FIBS) announced some information and a tentative schedule for the 2011 season in the Italian Baseball League during a meeting in Bologna. Opening day will be on April 14 with defending champion Cariparma Parma taking on UGF Bologna in a rematch of this year’s Italian Baseball Series. All eight team from 2010 will return and the format stays the same. With that, the Milan United franchise, which was announced a few weeks ago, has to wait at least another year to play in the IBL.
League play in the IBL will stop twice. On the weekend of June 4th no games will be played due to the European Cups, where Parma, Bologna and T&A San Marino will participate. A second interruption will introduce something new to Italian Baseball. Between June 26 and July 13 the Italian National Team will play an All-Star team five times in ten days in various ballparks in Italy. Fans will decide in a voting about the players for the All-Star squad. The semi-final round will be played between August 11 and 27, while the Italian Baseball Series is scheduled for September 2 to 17.
Additionally the FIBS is changing the starting times for the games, making them more family-friendly. Thursday and Friday games now will start at 8pm CET instead of 9pm CET. Saturday night games will begin at 7.30pm CET instead of 9pm CET. Doubleheaders on Saturdays would begin at 3pm CET. Make-up games on Sundays are supposed to start at 12pm CET now. Exceptions will be made for games on Sicily due to the flight schedules. However the FIBS will evaluate to new times after the first round and will decide if they will be permanent.
Tentative Schedule 2011 Italian Baseball League (PDF-Format)