New league aims to rekindle Pinoy interest in baseball

A new baseball league will be launched over the weekened at the Rizal Memorial Baseball Stadium with an inaugural series of games featuring five teams from Manila, Makati, Laguna, Cebu, and Negros Occidental. The new league — Baseball Philippines — is aims to rekindle interest in the sport among youth and adults alike The men behind the tournament attended Tuesday's Philippine Sportwriters Association (PSA) Forum at the Pantalan Restaurant in Manila. "There's a growing interest in baseball. It never really died after the sport's golden age in the 50s," said Community Sports Inc. (CSI) vice chairman and Pure Play Sports president Anthony Suntay. "We're here to help Philippines embrace again this very beautiful game," added Mike Styrbel, long time NCAA Division 1 umpire and now Baseball Philippines technical adviser. The league also aims to promote the sport as an alternative to community-based entertainment and to develop athletes who can trained to become national team members who will join various international competitions. In fact, the Philippine Amateur Baseball Association (PABA), through president Hector Navasero, has given full recognition to the event by signing a memorandum of agreement with CSI president Moying Martelino. PABA has also allowed members of the national team to be equally distributed among the participating teams to ensure competitiveness and parity in the league. "The program is now embodied in the yearly program of PABA and was included in the program we submitted to the Philippine Olympic Committee (POC)," stressed Eladio Baradas, PABA vice president, who was also present during the session. - GMANews.TV