8 ms·

A key detail you omitted: >Major League Baseball chose not to pause the season to allow its biggest stars to play in Tokyo, with the Americans made up of minor

by mb7733 5y ago

A key detail you omitted: >Major League Baseball chose not to pause the season to allow its biggest stars to play in Tokyo, with the Americans made up of minor league players.

tpoacher 5y ago
Yes, in the last Olympics. The article also covers dozens of olympics prior, where the US also failed to win gold. And even so, the point still stands. You can't call your national competitions "world" competitions as a country, and then send sub-par delegations and lose nationally at the world stage. I don't want to give the impression I'm getting any glee from this. It's just to point out the whole thing sounds so silly to a non-American.
- benglish11 5y ago
  The MLB World Series (and the MLB in general) has the best baseball talent in the world. It is not only made up of American players. The best from the Caribbean, South America, Europe and even many from Korea/Japan come to play in the MLB. In my memory the MLB has never released players to play in the Olympics. There have been several World Baseball Classics which have pitted national teams against each other and the competitive teams are mostly made up of MLB players playing for their native country. Just because all of the games are played in USA and Canada doesn’t mean the players don’t come from all around the world.
  - tpoacher 5y ago
    I mean, fair enough. This is a good point, and I'll take it. But, having said that, it also feels a bit like misdirection; I highly doubt the World Series is called the World Series because the otherwise US-owned teams involved contain international players. The implication of a 'world event' is that it consists of countries competing with each other, not US teams being open to hiring international players. It's called the World Series because it considers itself world-class and needs not consider sub-par outliers lying outside of the US; at least I think that's how most people would interpret the phrase. Which is why acknowledging that there are competitive teams outside of the US context makes that particular phrase problematic.
  - orf 5y ago
    If someone from another country visits my restaurant, it doesn’t become “world famous”. If someone from another country plays in a national-level sporting event where all teams are domestic ones, it doesn’t become a “World Series”.
- tzs 5y ago
  > Yes, in the last Olympics. The article also covers dozens of olympics prior, where the US also failed to win gold. Dozens? Baseball has only been in as a medal awarding non-exhibition sport in 6 Olympics (1992, 1996, 2000, 2004, 2008, and 2020). In 1992 and 1996 it was only open to amateurs. The countries where professional baseball player is a full time job sent players from their college teams. The only big baseball country that could actually send its top players was Cuba because the players on their top teams nominally have other jobs and were technically amateurs even though they actually trained and played baseball full time. Starting with 2000 pros were allowed, but MLB did not allow its players to go in 2000, 2004, or 2008. The US continued sending college players. The lack of the world's top players participating was a big factor in the IOC's decision to drop baseball from the 2012 and 2016 games. It return in 2020 and MLB did allow its players to participate, but none of its top players went [1]. [1] https://www.espn.com/olympics/story/_/id/31922257/olympics-2021-usa-baseball-team-beens-not-yets-aiming-gold https://www.espn.com/olympics/story/_/id/31922257/olympics-2...
  - tpoacher 5y ago
    Ok, fair enough, this provides useful context, and gives background to why the US, which otherwise sports major talent (and possibly similarly other countries), did not do as well in a world event as might have naively been expected by a casual observer. So if the argument in question was "Americans claim to be the best but they suck", you'd be absolutely right and well justified in your rebuttal. But it's not, and I wouldn't make that claim anyway because I have nothing against the US or its baseball tradition. Unfortunately the argument in question is "Can the World Series be classified as an international event, or does the name reflect nationalistic sentiment instead?" With this in mind, if anything, this rebuttal seems to provide further evidence against the World Series being aptly named. The message seems to be that the World Series is so called because it considers itself world-class and leagues ahead of other nations (which may or may not be true), and need not attempt to prove this fact by competing in the international stage earnestly or indeed bothering to send competitive teams to world events. So it indeed seems to be a national event which ascribes itself 'world' status out of nationalistic sentiment. Or at least, I think that's how most people (presumably including Americans) would perceive this name. I highly doubt there's a single American out there who honestly thinks that the World Series is a truly international event where teams from other countries somehow consistently fail to appear in televised finals.

by mb7733 5y ago

A key detail you omitted: >Major League Baseball chose not to pause the season to allow its biggest stars to play in Tokyo, with the Americans made up of minor league players.

tpoacher 5y ago

Yes, in the last Olympics. The article also covers dozens of olympics prior, where the US also failed to win gold. And even so, the point still stands. You can't call your national competitions "world" competitions as a country, and then send sub-par delegations and lose nationally at the world stage. I don't want to give the impression I'm getting any glee from this. It's just to point out the whole thing sounds so silly to a non-American.

benglish11 5y ago
The MLB World Series (and the MLB in general) has the best baseball talent in the world. It is not only made up of American players. The best from the Caribbean, South America, Europe and even many from Korea/Japan come to play in the MLB. In my memory the MLB has never released players to play in the Olympics. There have been several World Baseball Classics which have pitted national teams against each other and the competitive teams are mostly made up of MLB players playing for their native country. Just because all of the games are played in USA and Canada doesn’t mean the players don’t come from all around the world.
- tpoacher 5y ago
  I mean, fair enough. This is a good point, and I'll take it. But, having said that, it also feels a bit like misdirection; I highly doubt the World Series is called the World Series because the otherwise US-owned teams involved contain international players. The implication of a 'world event' is that it consists of countries competing with each other, not US teams being open to hiring international players. It's called the World Series because it considers itself world-class and needs not consider sub-par outliers lying outside of the US; at least I think that's how most people would interpret the phrase. Which is why acknowledging that there are competitive teams outside of the US context makes that particular phrase problematic.
- orf 5y ago
  If someone from another country visits my restaurant, it doesn’t become “world famous”. If someone from another country plays in a national-level sporting event where all teams are domestic ones, it doesn’t become a “World Series”.
tzs 5y ago
> Yes, in the last Olympics. The article also covers dozens of olympics prior, where the US also failed to win gold. Dozens? Baseball has only been in as a medal awarding non-exhibition sport in 6 Olympics (1992, 1996, 2000, 2004, 2008, and 2020). In 1992 and 1996 it was only open to amateurs. The countries where professional baseball player is a full time job sent players from their college teams. The only big baseball country that could actually send its top players was Cuba because the players on their top teams nominally have other jobs and were technically amateurs even though they actually trained and played baseball full time. Starting with 2000 pros were allowed, but MLB did not allow its players to go in 2000, 2004, or 2008. The US continued sending college players. The lack of the world's top players participating was a big factor in the IOC's decision to drop baseball from the 2012 and 2016 games. It return in 2020 and MLB did allow its players to participate, but none of its top players went [1]. [1] https://www.espn.com/olympics/story/_/id/31922257/olympics-2021-usa-baseball-team-beens-not-yets-aiming-gold https://www.espn.com/olympics/story/_/id/31922257/olympics-2...
- tpoacher 5y ago
  Ok, fair enough, this provides useful context, and gives background to why the US, which otherwise sports major talent (and possibly similarly other countries), did not do as well in a world event as might have naively been expected by a casual observer. So if the argument in question was "Americans claim to be the best but they suck", you'd be absolutely right and well justified in your rebuttal. But it's not, and I wouldn't make that claim anyway because I have nothing against the US or its baseball tradition. Unfortunately the argument in question is "Can the World Series be classified as an international event, or does the name reflect nationalistic sentiment instead?" With this in mind, if anything, this rebuttal seems to provide further evidence against the World Series being aptly named. The message seems to be that the World Series is so called because it considers itself world-class and leagues ahead of other nations (which may or may not be true), and need not attempt to prove this fact by competing in the international stage earnestly or indeed bothering to send competitive teams to world events. So it indeed seems to be a national event which ascribes itself 'world' status out of nationalistic sentiment. Or at least, I think that's how most people (presumably including Americans) would perceive this name. I highly doubt there's a single American out there who honestly thinks that the World Series is a truly international event where teams from other countries somehow consistently fail to appear in televised finals.