U-23 Baseball World Cup
Baseball world championship
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The U-23 Baseball World Cup is a biennial, professional-level, National Team, baseball world championship of the World Baseball Softball Confederation (WBSC), replacing Baseball World Cup.
| Most recent season or competition: 2024 U-23 Baseball World Cup | |
| |
| Formerly | 21U Baseball World Cup (2014) |
|---|---|
| Sport | Baseball |
| Founded | 2014 |
| No. of teams | 12 |
| Continent | International |
Most recent champion |  Japan (3rd title) |
| Most titles | Japan (3 titles) |
| Website | 2024 U-23 Baseball World Cup |
The inaugural tournament was held in November 2014, in Taichung, Taiwan, as the 21U Baseball World Cup, with each team made of 21-year-old and younger players but allowed for six players to be 23-year-old and younger.[1] Starting with the 2016 edition—in Monterrey, Mexico—the tournament has been expanded to permit nations to select players up to 23 years old for their entire rosters.[2] Players must also possess valid passports of the nations they are representing, in line with Olympic standards. The U-23 Baseball World Cup is the third-most-important international baseball tournament in terms of distribution of world ranking points, following the Premier12 and the World Baseball Classic.
The rosters of national teams that participated in the tournament included professional players from clubs affiliated to the Australian Baseball League, Chinese Professional Baseball League, Korea Baseball Organization, Major League Baseball, Mexican Baseball League, Nicaraguan Professional Baseball League, and Nippon Professional Baseball.
Classification
With the approved format of 12 national teams, the WBSC has distributed the continental quotas as follows:
- WBSC Africa: 1 spots
- WBSC Americas: 4 spots
- WBSC Asia: 3 spots
- WBSC Europe: 2 spots
- WBSC Oceania: 1 spots
- Wild cards: 1 spots (including hosts if necessary)
The participants will be determined through the continental championships.
Results
| Ed. | Years | Hosts[3] | Finalists | Semi-finalists | Teams | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Champions | Score | Runners-up | 3rd place | Score | 4th place | |||||||
| 21U Baseball World Cup | ||||||||||||
| 1 | 2014[4] Details |
 Taichung |
 Chinese Taipei |
9–0 | Japan |
 South Korea |
10–4 |  Nicaragua |
11 | |||
| U-23 Baseball World Cup | ||||||||||||
| 1 | 2016[5][6] Details |
 Monterrey |
Japan |
10–3 |  Australia |
South Korea |
5–3 |  Panama |
12 | |||
| 2 | 2018[7] Details |
 Barranquilla |
Mexico |
2–1 | Japan |
 Venezuela |
5–4 | South Korea |
12 | |||
| 3 | 2020[8] Details[R 1] |
Ciudad Obregon Hermosillo |
Venezuela |
4–0 | Mexico |
Colombia |
5–3 |  Cuba |
12 | |||
| 4 | 2022[9] Details |
Taipei, Taichung, Yunlin[10] |
Japan |
3–0 | South Korea |
Chinese Taipei |
3–1 | Mexico |
12 | |||
| 5 | 2024[11] Details |
 Shaoxing[12] |
Japan |
5–0 |  Puerto Rico |
Nicaragua |
3–1 | China |
12 | |||
| 6 | 2026[13] Details |
León, Managua, Masaya[14] |
12 | |||||||||
- Notes
- Originally scheduled to be held in 2020, but due to the COVID-19 pandemic, postponed to September 2021.
Medal table
| Rank | Nation | Gold | Silver | Bronze | Total |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Japan | 3 | 2 | 0 | 5 |
| 2 | Mexico | 1 | 1 | 0 | 2 |
| 3 | Chinese Taipei | 1 | 0 | 1 | 2 |
| Venezuela | 1 | 0 | 1 | 2 | |
| 5 | South Korea | 0 | 1 | 2 | 3 |
| 6 | Australia | 0 | 1 | 0 | 1 |
| Puerto Rico | 0 | 1 | 0 | 1 | |
| 8 | Colombia | 0 | 0 | 1 | 1 |
| Nicaragua | 0 | 0 | 1 | 1 | |
| Totals (9 entries) | 6 | 6 | 6 | 18 | |
Participating nations
Host country
| Nation | 2014 | 2016 | 2018 | 2021 | 2022 | 2024 | 2026 | Years |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 Argentina | 9 | 1 | ||||||
| Australia | 6 |  | 9 | 6 | 9 | q | 6 | |
 Austria | 12 | 1 | ||||||
| China | 4 | 1 | ||||||
| Chinese Taipei |  | 7 | 5 | 6 |  | 8 | q | 7 |
| Colombia | 7 | | 5 | 10 | 4 | |||
| Cuba | 4 | 10 | q | 3 | ||||
 Czech Republic | 5 | 10 | 12 | 12 | q | 5 | ||
 Dominican Republic | 6 | 9 | 2 | |||||
 Great Britain | 11 | q | 2 | |||||
 Germany | 11 | 11 | 2 | |||||
 Italy | 7 | 1 | ||||||
| Japan | | | | | | q | 6 | |
| Mexico | 11 | 5 | | | 4 | 5 | ||
 Netherlands | 9 | 10 | 10 | 8 | 7 | 5 | ||
 New Zealand | 10 | 1 | ||||||
| Nicaragua | 4 | 6 | 7 | | q | 5 | ||
| Panama | 4 | 5 | q | 3 | ||||
| Puerto Rico | 8 | 9 | | q | 4 | |||
 South Africa | 11 | 11 | 12 | 12 | q | 5 | ||
| South Korea | | | 4 | 8 | | 6 | q | 7 |
| Venezuela | 8 | 8 | | | 7 | 5 | q | 7 |
| Nations | 11 | 12 | 12 | 12 | 12 | 12 | 12 |