Why not keep Baseball/Softball?

Question

If not an International sport why put it in the first place

Answer 1

They are taking baseball and softball out of the oymplics because the USA is so good at it a couple of games ended early because the USA was so far ahead

Answer 2

It is the best sport in the world! I cannot believe they are getting rid of it. I grew up playing softball and one of my dreams was to play on the olympic team, what about those other little girls who have that same dream. They're going to be crushed! :(

Answer 3

Baseball isn't a national sport...only native to america.

Answer 4

The base reason is that baseball is not "international" enough to be kept in.  You have a few strongholds for the sport in North America and Asia, but other than those two regions, the sport is simply not popular enough.

Another reason is that MLB is so asinine about the Olympics.  Many countries that compete in Baseball (including the US) cannot send their top players because MLB won't release the players to play in the Olympics or take a break during the season.  The Olympic Committee would be more likely to keep Baseball in if MLB would commit to sending the top players, because then you would have more buzz overseas and perhaps grow the sport internationally.

Softball sort of got the shaft because many members of the IOC and the public at large regard Softball and Baseball as the same, when in fact they are two completely seperate sports, with their own international federations and everything.

And to whoever thinks that the host country gets to choose which events are in or out, you're completely wrong.  The IOC chooses by a vote which sports to include and decides whether to allow new events within sports.  A few years ago, (BEFORE London was awarded the 2012 games) a vote was held on every sport by the IOC to decide whether or not to keep the sports in the games after 2008, and Baseball and Softball were the only events that did not win the vote.

Answer 5

Well they saw that Canada was winning at something so they decided to s***w over Canada.

Answer 6

The International Olympic Committee is the committee which decides which sports are added and which sports are removed every Olympics.  Prior to this, only polo has been removed in 1936.

The reason why the sports are there in the first place is to create hope that popularity will spread internationally and that countries will start practicing the sport.  However, it stands that since baseball was introduced as a medal-awarding sport in 1992, it still is not a very popular international sport, as outside of the U.S., Japan, and South Korea, not many countries play the sport.  Softball is more popular internationally, but the U.S. dominates it too much for it to be deemed competitive anymore.

One reason I see it being unpopular is game time.  Most sports that deal with two individuals or two teams facing off in a bracket format have very short individual game times.  Badminton matches only last an hour on average, fencing matches only last half an hour, and archery matches only last ten minutes.  I consider tennis to be relatively fast, but even tennis matches take around two hours to complete on average, slow compared to the Olympics norm.  Baseball games last three and a half hours on average, a span in which an entire archery tournament could probably be finished in should they try to do so.  It is too difficult for international fans to get into due to the pace.