Jews on first – and every other position

While it hasn’t actually started yet, a new national baseball league is about to start play in Israel towards the end of June.  The league which will start with 6 teams, 3 of them managed by former major leaguers and world series winners Art Shamsky (starting outfielder 69 miracle Mets) Ron Blomberg (first ever designated hitter in MLB) and Ken Holtzman (2 major league no-hitters) is preparing Israel for entry into the next world baseball classic.  While there might be an initial instinct to guffaw (big deal – a country of 7 million people with no baseball history – they’ll be gone faster than South Africa if they make it that far) keep in mind that world classic baseball rules enable a player to play for any country under whose natural rules that person would be eligible for automatic citizenship.  Since under Israel’s “law of return” any Jew (not athlete specific) is automatically eligible for citizenship
Israel could field a team that includes at its core the following Jewish players (probably more but this is what comes to mind) 

Pitching

• Jason Marquis – St. Louis Cardinals
• Jason Hirsh –Houston Astros
• Scott Schoeneweis – Cincinati Reds
• John Grabow – Pittsburgh Pirates
• Craig Breslow – Boston Red Sox
• Scott Feldman – Texas Rangers 

Catching

• Brad Ausmus – Houston Astros
• Mike Lieberthal – Philadelphia Phillies 

Infield

• Kevin Youklis – Boston Red Sox

• Ian Kinsler – Texas Rangers

• David Newhan – NY Mets 

Outfield

• Shawn Green – NY Mets
• Gabe Kapler – Red Sox (just retired) 

These guys are all legitimate MLBers though none except maybe Green, Ausmus or Youklis have even an outside chance of being asked to join the US team.  If they wanted to experience the WBC it would probably make ther moms happy at least if they played under Israel’s flag (even though they’d obviously never play in the Israeli league).  

Add on to that fringe MLB players (such as Mike Koplove and Alan Levine who have pitched in the MLB in the last few seasons though they’re not on rosters now), minor leaguers (such as Toronto’s minor leaguer Adam Stern) and the players in the local Israeli league (both Israelis and imports from minor league teams in the US) being developed by the former MLBers and league chief of development ex Red Sox Manager Dan Duquette, Israel might just surprise some people out there.  Noone’s thinking they’d win it all of course but they might upset some teams along the way.  You never know :- ). 

For more on the Israeli league http://www.israelbaseballleague.com/main/

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