After a roller coaster ride in 2023, Korea Baseball finished the year ranked fourth in the world.

With 4,353 ranking points, Korea is ranked fourth in the WBSC/Konami Men’s Baseball World Rankings released by the World Baseball Softball Confederation (WBSC) today (April 19), behind Japan (5797 points), Mexico (4764 points) and the United States (4492 points).

In the WBSC/Konami World Rankings, the WBSC-organized Premier12 has the most points at stake (1380 for the winner). The WBC, organized by Major League Baseball, is worth 1,050 points for first place, while points are also awarded for various international events such as the Age Group Baseball World Cup (690 points for the winner) and the Asian Games (235 points for the gold medal).

South Korea will play three international tournaments in 2023 alone, 온라인카지노 starting with the WBC in March, followed by the Asian Games in Hangzhou in September and the Asian Professional Baseball Championship (APBC) in November.

The WBC was a disaster.

Under the leadership of Lee Kang-chul, who led the KT Wiz to the 2021 title, the team was joined by major leaguers such as Kim Ha-seong (San Diego Padres) and Tommy Edmon (St. Louis Cardinals), but they were swept by the underdogs, Australia, and humiliated by Japan in the first round for the third straight WBC. It was a grim tournament, with controversies involving Kang Baek-ho (KT), Kim Kwang-hyun (SSG), Lee Yong-chan (NC), and Jeong Chul-won (Doosan) entering a bar during the tournament.

After the WBC, the KBO launched the KBO League and Team Korea Leveling Up Project to rebuild the organization. It launched a major reorganization aimed at expanding the base, intensifying development, leveling up the league, strengthening the national team’s competitiveness, and creating a virtuous cycle of building a sustainable baseball powerhouse.

Starting with the Hangzhou Asian Games, Korea set its own age limit for the rebuilding program. It fielded a team of players aged 24 or younger, or in their third year of playing, and won the coveted gold medal at the Asian Games. Moon Dong-joo (Hanwha), Park Young-hyun (KT), Noh Si-hwan (Hanwha), Yoon Dong-hee (Lotte), and Choi Ji-min (KIA) were among the young players who were discovered and performed well, showing the future of Korean baseball.

Korea also saw hope in the APBC, another age-group tournament.

In their first match, they narrowly won against Australia in a penalty shootout, then faced Japan and lost 1-2, but advanced to the final with a win over Taiwan before facing Japan again in a “lost but fought well” match. The ‘Young Power’ from the Asian Games showed off their skills at the Tokyo Dome, the heart of Japanese baseball.

South Korea sits in fourth place with 418 points after winning the gold medal at the Hangzhou Asian Games with 235 points and finishing third at the U-18 World Cup. At the WBC, they suffered a first-round exit and finished with 621 points.

After Korea, Chinese Taipei is fifth (4170 points), Venezuela is sixth (3975 points), the Netherlands is seventh (3288 points), Cuba is eighth (3121 points), 사설 토토사이트 the Dominican Republic is ninth (2667 points) and Panama is 10th (2534 points). Australia is 11th with 2367 points and Puerto Rico is 12th with 2355 points.