The Korean National Baseball Team is about to be truly tested once again. The schedule for the third edition of the Premier12 has been finalized.
The World Baseball Softball Confederation (WBSC) today announced the participating countries and dates for the third edition of the Premier12. Organized by the WBSC and presented by RAXUS, the tournament will feature 12 teams ranked No. 1 through 12 in the men’s baseball world rankings. It is the largest international professional baseball tournament organized by the WBSC. The World Baseball Classic (WBC) is not organized by the WBSC, but by the Major League Baseball (MLB) office in the United States.
Most of the nations ranked 1-12 in the world competing in these three tournaments are powerhouses. World No. 1 Japan, No. 2 Mexico, No. 3 USA, No. 4 South Korea, No. 5 Taiwan, No. 6 Venezuela, No. 7 Netherlands, No. 8 Cuba, No. 9 Dominican Republic, No. 10 Panama, No. 11 Australia, and No. 12 Puerto Rico. Panama will be competing in the Premier12 for the first time, while Australia qualified for the second consecutive time.
WBSC President Riccardo Fraccari said: “Congratulations to the top 12 teams who have qualified for the Premier12. We have had two memorable editions of this flagship WBSC event and we look forward to next year’s edition of the premier international baseball competition, 바카라사이트 which is sure to be a hit with baseball fans around the world.”
The third edition of the Premier12 will take place from November 10-24, 2024.
The 12 participating nations will be divided into two groups and play a round robin format, with the top two teams from each group meeting in the Super Round. The two winners of the four super rounds will play a championship match for the title, while the two losers will play for the bronze medal.
The tournament will be held from November 10-14 (venue to be announced) for Group A, with Group B opening on November 13 at the Nagoya Dome in Japan, followed by the main round in Taipei City from November 14-18. The Super Round will then be held on November 21-23 at the Tokyo Dome in Japan.
South Korea will most likely be in Group B, which means they will have to play their first game in Nagoya if they are drawn against Japan in the opening round. Otherwise, they will only play their preliminary round games in Taipei before traveling to the Tokyo Dome if they advance to the Super Round.
The Korean National Baseball Team is the defending Premier12 Invitational champions. In the 2015 edition of the tournament, Kim In-sung’s team went 3-2 in group play before defeating Cuba in the quarterfinals and Japan in the semifinals before sweeping the United States in the final. Kim Hyun-soo (LG) was named the tournament MVP. In the second edition of the tournament in 2019, South Korea won the runner-up silver medal before falling to Japan in the final.
It will be five years since the tournament was canceled due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
While the team is proud to be the inaugural winners of the Premier12, there is also a lot of pressure on them to prove themselves once again as they are struggling to rebuild their international reputation, which has fallen to rock bottom in recent years.
In fact, the national team’s international performance has actually declined since their first-round exit at the 2017 WBC. A Premier12 runner-up finish in 2019 wasn’t bad enough, but they’ve since fallen further down the pecking order. A first-round exit at the WBC in March of this year followed the ‘no-medal’ shock of the Tokyo Olympics. This was South Korea’s third consecutive first-round exit, dating back to the 2013 WBC.
Since then, the KBO and the national baseball team have vowed to tear everything down and replace it with a new generation. The golden generation of players from the ’80s, starting with the Beijing Olympic gold medal, all announced their retirement from the national team, while the Hangzhou Asian Games featured a team of players in their 20s.
The Asian Games started with concerns that the team would be the weakest in history, but it still managed to win a much-anticipated gold medal, finally revitalizing the baseball team after years of stagnation. At the Asian Professional Baseball Championship (APBC) in Tokyo last month, the team finished as runners-up, unable to finish off last-place Japan, but the green light was given for a generational change.
The Premier 12 is a different stage from the Asian Games and APBC.
At the Asian Games, Asia’s strongest team, Japan, was not a strong opponent as they fielded a team made up entirely of unemployed baseball players. The APBC is also not a full-strength tournament as it is dominated by players in their early 20s from four countries – South Korea, Japan, Taiwan, and Australia.
The Premier 12 will likely field a near full squad, with Japan, the United States, and even some Latin American nations excluding some major leaguers. 사설토토 It’s a different atmosphere than the Asian Games and APBC, where the best of the best are expected to show up.
The Premier12 could prove to be a true generational change.