Organizers of the Los Angeles Olympics remain optimistic that Major League Baseball will find a way to join the NFL to send the world’s best athletes in their respective sports to the 2028 game.
LA28 president and chair Casey Wasserman said he is in close contact with MLB commissioner Rob Manfred about the decisions that both the league and the players’ union must make regarding whether or not to send players to the Olympics mid-2028 baseball season. There is no current timetable for decisions.
“It’s because it’s the right thing for the sport of baseball, it’s the right thing for the players, and certainly the right thing for the Olympics,” Wasserman told the Associated Press on Wednesday. “I think when things make sense for everyone, you usually find a way to get things done.”
LA28 was backed by an unanimous decision last week that NFL owners would approve players’ participation in the first Olympic flag football event, and Wasserman calls it a “great day.” The Los Angeles Organising Committee hopes for similar news about baseball whenever a decision is made.
[Related: What might an NFL flag football Dream Team look like in 2028 Olympics?]
“We work very much with the commissioners,” Wasserman said. “I spoke to him in anticipation of the NFL announcement, so they knew what was coming. They’re in the middle of the season, so they’re taking on another challenge, but we’re very committed to the ongoing discussion with hopes of getting good results.”
Player Union Head Tony Clark says his players want to compete against those who have experienced international competition in Olympic Gold, particularly in the previous world baseball classics. Several superstars have expressed public interest in playing in the Los Angeles Olympic tournament.
However, with the Olympics at the heart of the regular season, the decision will be much tougher for baseball, requiring a major scheduling change similar to the quarterly disruption of the NHL season, when the league will take part in the Winter Olympics. Baseball is also not a pillar of an Olympic program like ice hockey, but has only been intermittently included in summer games for decades.
NFL players who make up the country’s 10 flag football teams are unlikely to miss more than a few days of training camp in July 2028, but MLB will need to make dramatic adjustments to their usual competitive schedule.
Manfred spoke about the decision last month at an Associated Press sports editors’ meeting in New York. Wasserman has been pitching Manfred for more than a year on the benefits of putting his sport under the Olympic spotlight.
“This is a complicated issue for us,” Manfred said at the APSE event. “There are likely many major league players involved, so many major league players are involved and are trying to break the season down significantly and sort it all out, taking into account timing.
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While talking to the American Association of Baseball Writers last summer, Manfred said, “You might think Casey is the most convincing thing to do with baseball at the Olympics.
The sport, long known as American entertainment, was performed only as a one-game Olympics exhibition until it took part in the Los Angeles program as a demonstration sport in 1984.
Baseball became the official Olympic sport in Barcelona in 1992, but US experts were not allowed to compete until 2000 when minor leaguers were allowed to play. The absence of players from around the world was one of the reasons baseball was subsequently cited when it was dropped from the London and Rio de Janeiro games.
The sport returned to baseball Tokyo in 2021, but only for MLB players who are not on the 40 roster. Japan’s top league closed its season and Japan won gold.
Baseball was dropped again in Paris, but was restored for LA28. The tournament will take place at the Historic Dodger Stadium, the same venue where the 1984 Olympic Tournament was held.
Wasserman spoke about his baseball aspirations after an event that reminded MLB of the Olympics’ unparalleled marketing power. NBCuniversal will take over a large soundstage complex in the suburban Sun Valley, creating extensive multimedia content for use in the broadcast of the Milan Cortina Winter Olympics in nine months, increasing winter stars, including celebrities such as Croeime, Michaela Shifflin and Lindsay.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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