LAUSANNE, Switzerland – The official competition schedule of the 2014 15U Baseball World Cup has been announced, revealing that all eighteen participating National Teams will be competing on Opening Day.
The most elite selection of 15-year-old baseball players in the world will be competing for their countries in the II 15U Baseball World Cup — the highest level of competition in baseball for this age group — which will be staged from 31-July to 10-August in Culiacan, Los Mochis and Mazatlán, Mexico.
Following IBAF’s international rules, players who are eligible to participate in the 2014 15U Baseball World Cup must be born in 1999 or thereafter.
It was also announced that the Central American country — and world No. 52 — Guatemala has been added to Group A.
To open the 15U World Cup, teams within each group will compete in a round-robin that consists of five games in five days, with the top two finishers from each group advancing to the second round.
The majority of the 2014 15U World Cup field (sixteen of the eighteen participating nations) boasts a World Ranking between No. 1 – 31.
No. 13 Panama, No. 14 Australia and No. 15 Brazil will all be aiming to make a push at the U-15 World Cup to improve their position within the rankings, in order to qualify for the 2015 Premier12 – the recently announced professional-level World Championship in which the world’s top-twelve ranked nations at the end of 2014 will qualify. No. 10 Venezuela, No. 11 Italy and No. 12 Mexico can use a solid 15U performance to help secure their position as a ‘Premier12’ nation.
Venezuela will come into the event as the defending 15U World Champion, handing Cuba its only loss at the gold medal finale of the inaugural 15U Baseball World Cup in 2012; Cuba and Venezuela are both in Group C (Loc Mochis) and have a rematch scheduled on Day 2 (Friday, 1 Aug).
Chinese Taipei earned the bronze medal in 2012, defeating host Mexico — both will be in Group A in Culiacan.
The 2014 15U world championship will be the first time that either No.1 USA or No. 2 Japan — both be competing in Group B in Mazatlan — will be represented. Others making their debuts are Australia, Czech Republic, New Zealand, Panama and South Africa – which connects Africa and Oceania to the 15U Baseball World Cup platform for the first time ever.
Baseball’s 2014 15U global platform expands across Africa, the Americas (i.e., the Caribbean, North-, Central- and South America), Asia, Europe and Oceania.
Coverage of the eighty-three world championship matches will be enhanced by online play-by-play (i.e., 15U Baseball World Cup CBS Sports GameTracker) and through social media (by following @BWC15U on Twitter and “BaseballWorldCup” on Facebook and Instagram; official hash tag #BWC15U). Broadcast details are expected to be announced in the coming days.
About the U-15 Baseball World Cup:
Launched in 2012 by the International Baseball Federation and played every two years, the 15U Baseball World Cup is baseball’s highest and most elite level of competition in this age category, like the 12U Baseball World Cup. And also like the 12U event, the 15U Baseball World Cup is the only world championship across all of sport to feature National Teams within this age range.
Past players who have competed on the youth Baseball World Cup platforms include Canada’s Brett Lawrie, Japan’s Yu Darvish and Shohei Ohtani, South Korea’s Shin-soo Choo, Cuba’s Aroldis Chapman and Yasiel Puig, and USA’s Clayton Kershaw, Justin Upton and Buster Posey, among countless others past and future stars.
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