BTW, if your curious Armin-Wolf Arena is by far the best stadium in Germany. It's small by American standards, of course, but from what I've read it's well-maintained and it has been in the past been expanded to over 10,000 seats for major events like World Cups and European Championships.

So it's the four teams that were two and done (Canada, Taiwan, South Africa and Panama IIRC) last time competing against 12 new teams for four spots? Oh, and I found the list from another site:
Brazil
Canada
Chinese Tapai (Taiwan)
Columbia
Czech Republic
France
Germany
Great Britain
Israel
New Zealand
Nicaragua
Panama
Phillipines
South Africa
Spain
Thailand

http://mlbreports.com/2011/06/16/wbc/

Wanted to comment only to boost the numbers for any WBC posts, which I always like reading. And to say that Regensburg is a wonderful place to visit. I spent three happy months there a few years back. That it's now hosting these qualifiers (and is the home of one of the best European baseball teams) makes me want to go back even more.

Holy cow - Regensburg is a Sister City to my city. I hope the concession stands there serve Bavarian pretzels.

Requiring teams to play a qualifier without major leaguers for an event played with major leaguers seems like an odd way to go about things. I assume MLB wanted to have the widest possible geographical footprint for these games/qualifiers, but it seems like it would have been better to have the qualifier operate as a play-in (i.e., play the qualifier round immediately before the first round of the WBC at the first-round sites, with the winners advancing into R1 of the WBC a few days later).

Only four of the qualifier teams will advance, so it's not like dozens of major leaguers (or even minor leaguers) would be kept away from the MLB teams for an inordinate amount of time.

Max Kepler is going to pirouette all over those relatively tall orange clowns.

Which is the worst of the teams in #2? My assumption is Thailand.

Also, I enjoy the typo, and wonder how many of those national teams the Columbia University 9 could take on.

Woo hoo! With any luck I'll be there.

I assumed that Canada would've hosted any qualifying tournament they were in. Guess Toronto will host WBC finals games instead, like last time (unless Canada gets knocked out!).

Of the remaining qualifiers, here's one way the groupings could go:

at Panama City
--------------
Brazil
Colombia
Nicaragua
Panama

at Johannesburg
---------------
France
Israel
South Africa
Spain

at Taipei
---------
New Zealand
Phillipines
Taiwan
Thailand

EDIT: I changed the Madrid regional to Johannesburg, so that the four regionals could be on four different continents. (Do they have any actual baseball stadiums in ZA? Or could they play in a cricket stadium?)

Oh man, I will root for Thailand. How can I get a hat?

9 — Those groupings make sense geographically, but they're highly imbalanced. At minimum, either Colombia or Nicaragua should get moved to the Jo'burg group, with one of France, Israel, or Spain playing in Panama City. (The Taipei group would also be imbalanced, but that one's tougher geographically, and MLB probably wants to ensure that Taiwan makes the main event rather than Panama, Colombia, and Nicaragua each possibly winning a qualifier.)

BTW, to get an idea on what the Canadian team will look like (assuming that no MLB or 40-man roster people can get permission to play), check out Canada's roster for the 2011 Pan Am games and 2011 World Cup.

If Canada can get Shawn Hill and Scott Richmond there that should give them a 1-2 punch that beats everyone else.

It will be a bit tense though, as it's effectively Canada's spot to lose. Not to mention the fact that if I do go it will be with a bunch of British folk and the first game is against the UK. If Canada doesn't win that game I could be in for a rough night.

Saw on BaseballDeWorld that Panama will host the Latin America section in November.... and that MARIANO RIVERA has said he'll participate. However, it didn't source anything, so I don't know if it's real or not. If Mo were to actually participate in the Nov. WBC stuff, it'd basically be him announcing that he's going to retire from MLB...

Saw on BaseballDeWorld that Panama will host the Latin America section in November.... and that MARIANO RIVERA has said he'll participate.

He'd probably only pitch a few innings, but that could be a big boost, especially if the other teams didn't have their top ML talent.

If Mo were to actually participate in the Nov. WBC stuff, it'd basically be him announcing that he's going to retire from MLB...

This is another thing I don't like about having the qualifier so far in advance. Rivera presumably could retire from MLB, help Panama qualify for the WBC, and then not show up for the actual event 4-5 months later, either by choice or due to injury. The same could be true for other difference-maker players from countries like Colombia and Nicaragua.

This is another thing I don't like about having the qualifier so far in advance. Rivera presumably could retire from MLB, help Panama qualify for the WBC, and then not show up for the actual event 4-5 months later, either by choice or due to injury. The same could be true for other difference-maker players from countries like Colombia and Nicaragua.

The reverse is true for Canada. (Hopefully) most of the WBC roster will have been unavailable for qualifiers.

BTW, to get an idea on what the Canadian team will look like (assuming that no MLB or 40-man roster people can get permission to play), check out Canada's roster for the 2011 Pan Am games and 2011 World Cup.

Where's Stubby Clapp?

The reverse is true for Canada. (Hopefully) most of the WBC roster will have been unavailable for qualifiers.

Right. The WBC is great, but they seem to have confused "feature" and "bug" when implementing some of these changes.

Right. The WBC is great, but they seem to have confused "feature" and "bug" when implementing some of these changes.

I think the thing is, Canada only have themselves to blame. This level of qualifier is intended to be for teams that are far enough down the pole that they have no MLB talent. If Canada hadn't played like a bunch of saps in 2009 they wouldn't be in this mess.

I think the thing is, Canada only have themselves to blame. This level of qualifier is intended to be for teams that are far enough down the pole that they have no MLB talent. If Canada hadn't played like a bunch of saps in 2009 they wouldn't be in this mess.

Of course, let's admit it here: If the US or DR had laid a giant egg, MLB would then change the rules or something, like declare that any country with X amount of MLB players would be automatically eligible, or something.

He'd probably only pitch a few innings, but that could be a big boost, especially if the other teams didn't have their top ML talent.

Well, he was a starter in the minors.

BTW, if, indeed, the WBC qualifier in Panama will be all the Central/South America countries, that will be the (qualifying) group of death. Even the worst team (Brazil) still would probably have several minor leaguers on the roster.