World Baseball Classic moved from 2021 to 2023

USA Baseball (Wikimedia Commons)

According to the Associated Press on Monday, the 2021 World Baseball Classic has been moved to 2023 because of coronavirus. Even though the event is 10 months away and there could be a vaccine for this awful disease by then, there were supposed to be two qualification tournaments which were to have taken place in Tucson, Arizona this past March. However, those events were cancelled because it was simply too unsafe for the players to be on the field at that time.

The first qualifier consisted of South Africa, France, Germany, Nicaragua, Brazil, and Pakistan from March 13 to 18. The second qualifier consisted of Great Britain, New Zealand, the Philippines, the Czech Republic, Panama, and Spain from March 20 to 25. The most high profile player who was to compete in the qualifier was former Denver Broncos quarterback Tim Tebow of Makati, Philippines. Now a prospect in the New York Mets system, Tebow switched to baseball in 2016.

The top two teams in each qualifier were to join the 16 teams that already qualified because they participated in the 2017 World Baseball Classic. They were Australia, Canada, China, Chinese Taipei, Colombia, Cuba, Dominican Republic, Italy, Israel, Japan, Mexico, the Netherlands, Puerto Rico, South Korea, the United States, and Venezuela.

The 2021 World Baseball Classic was scheduled to take place in Taichung, Taiwan; Tokyo, Japan; Phoenix, Arizona; and Miami, Florida. There have been three prior World Baseball Classic champions. Japan won the first two titles in 2006 and 2009. They were followed by the Dominican Republic in 2013 and then the United States in 2017.