After NFL approval, LA28's Wasserman is optimistic MLB players will also find a path to the Olympics
LOS ANGELES (AP) — The organizers of the Los Angeles Olympics remain optimistic that Major League Baseball will find a way to join the NFL in sending the world's best athletes in their respective sports to the 2028 Games.
LA28 president and chairman Casey Wasserman said he has been in close contact with MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred about the decision that must be made by both the league and the players' union on whether to send players to the Olympics in the middle of the 2028 baseball season. There's no current timetable for the decision.
'I'm optimistic because it's the right thing for the sport of baseball, it's the right thing for the players and it's certainly the right thing for the Olympics,' Wasserman told The Associated Press on Wednesday. 'I think when things make sense for everybody, you can usually find a way to get things done.'
LA28 was buoyed last week by the NFL owners' unanimous decision to approve the players' participation in the inaugural Olympic flag football event, with Wasserman calling it 'an awesome day." The Los Angeles organizing committee is hoping for similar news on baseball, whenever the decision is made.
'We're very engaged with the commissioner,' Wasserman said. 'I talked to him in anticipation of the NFL announcement so they knew what was coming. They have a different challenge because it's in the middle of their season, but we are very engaged in ongoing discussions with the hope to get to a good result.'
Players' union head Tony Clark has said his players want to vie for Olympic gold — particularly those who got a taste of international competition in previous World Baseball Classics. Several superstars have expressed public interest in playing in the Los Angeles Olympic tournament, including reigning league MVPs Aaron Judge and Shohei Ohtani.
But the decision is much tougher for baseball because the Olympics fall in the heart of the regular season, necessitating major scheduling changes similar to the quadrennial disruption of the NHL season when the league participates in the Winter Olympics. Baseball also isn't a pillar of the Olympic program like ice hockey, being only intermittently included in the Summer Games for decades.
The NFL players who make their nations' 10-man flag football teams are unlikely to miss more than a few days of training camp in July 2028, but MLB would have to make a dramatic adjustment to its normal competition schedule.
Manfred spoke about the decision last month in New York at a meeting of the Associated Press Sports Editors. Wasserman has been pitching Manfred for over a year on the benefits of putting his sport under the Olympic spotlight.
'It's a complicated issue for us,' Manfred said at the APSE event. "Lots of major league players would be involved because of the different countries that would likely be involved, massively disruptive to our season given the timing, and we're trying to sort through all that. ... We do see LA28 as a real opportunity from a marketing perspective.'
The sport long known as America's Pastime was played only as one-game Olympic exhibitions until 1984, when it joined the Los Angeles program as a demonstration sport.
Baseball became an official Olympic sport in Barcelona in 1992, but U.S. professionals weren't allowed to compete until 2000, when minor leaguers were allowed to play. The absence of the world's players was one reason cited when baseball was subsequently dropped from the London and Rio de Janeiro Games.
The sport returned in baseball-mad Tokyo in 2021 — but only for MLB players not on a 40-man roster. Japan's top league shut down its season, and Japan won gold.
Baseball was dropped once again in Paris, but restored for LA28. The tournament will be played at historic Dodger Stadium, the same venue that hosted the 1984 Olympic tournament.
Wasserman spoke about his baseball aspirations after an event that should remind MLB of the Olympics' unmatched marketing power. NBCUniversal has taken over a large soundstage complex in suburban Sun Valley to create extensive multimedia content to be used in the Milan Cortina Winter Olympics broadcasts in nine months, feeding the broadcast machine that boosts winter stars including Chloe Kim, Mikaela Shiffrin and Lindsey Vonn to international celebrity.
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AP sports: https://apnews.com/sports
Greg Beacham, The Associated Press
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