Major League Baseball (MLB) announced that the MLB CUP in Japan involved 143 teams and 1,759 fourth and fifth-grade students from May to July 2021.
MLB Japan (MLBJ) was forced to cancel the finals scheduled in Ishinomaki City due to a surge in COVID-19 cases. The 13 teams that had qualified for the finals participated in clinics with former MLB stars Takashi Saito, Hideki Okajima and Mac Suzuki.
MLBJ also announced that the 2022 edition would open in late April. The regional phase will last through July. The number of participating teams will expand to 150. The projected number of players will again exceed 1,700.
Ishinomaki City will host the national finals between the 16 winners of the regional phases.
In 2011 3,000 inhabitants of the city lost their lives due to the devastating earthquake and tsunami that triggered the nuclear meltdown at the Fukushima Daiichi plant.
The MLB CUP started in 2007 in China. During the 2021 season, MLB CUP China attracted over 6,000 players in the 6-15 age bracket, while MLB CUPs also took place in India and Korea.
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