In the first of the 16 months of the program, at least 200 kids at risk have been kept away from street gangs and violence and have attended structured and supervised baseball practices twice a week or more.

Rob Ducey, Tom Cheek and Nat Bailey will also be honoured in a ceremony to take place at 11 a.m. ET on Saturday, June 29 on the museum’s ceremonial grounds in St. Marys

Cuba’s preliminary roster for the upcoming World Baseball Classic – now swollen from an original 28 selections to a current list of 36 – checked into Havana’s Hotel Tulipan on Monday morning and immediately began extensive training in Latin American Stadium under the guidance and careful watchful eyes of national team manager Victor Mesa, technical director (general manager) Jorge Fuentes, and league commissioner Higinio Vélez.

Against a backdrop of preparation and anticipation for the upcoming 2013 World Baseball Classic, the Cuban League has now wrapped up a “qualification” 45-game first stage in its newly structured National Series XLII season. For the third time (following 2006 and 2009) the Cuban Federation has been forced to suspend play midway through the winter in order to accommodate training for and participation in the “Classic”.

Cartagena, Colombia. The Executive Committee of the International Baseball Federation celebrated its first meeting of 2013 in Cartagena and welcomed Curacao and Saipan as the newest National Federations of the baseball family. Saipan, however, will need to submit the official name of its national federation to the IBAF for final approval.

The winter league season in baseball is coming traditionally to an end with the Caribbean Series. The 2013 event, which will be held from February 1 to February 7 in Hermosillo, Mexico, will feature the winter league champions from Mexico (Yaquis de Obregon), Puerto Rico (Criollos de Caguas), the Dominican Republic (Leones del Escogido) and Venezuela (Navegantes del Magallanes).

For the third year, Major League Baseball International (MLBI), in cooperation with the Confederation of Brazilian Baseball & Softball (CBBS), will conduct a MLBI Elite Camp, led by Hall of Famer Barry Larkin, in São Paulo, Brazil.

Collegiate Baseball Tournament Designed to Give HBCU Baseball Programs National Exposure Returns to Houston for Second Consecutive Year; All Games will be Played at Minute Maid Park, Home of the Houston Astros; Saturday’s Contests to Air Live on MLB Network and MLB.com

Miracle on Grass – How Hall of Famer Tommy Lasorda led Team USA to a shocking upset over Cuba, capturing the only Olympic gold medal in USA Baseball history

Major League Baseball announced the game times for its master 2013 regular season schedule, which will begin on March 31st with ESPN’s “Sunday Night Baseball” when the Houston Astros host the Texas Rangers at 8:00 p.m. (ET) / 7:00 p.m. (CT). The final day of the 2013 regular season, which features 11 divisional match-ups, is scheduled for Sunday, September 29th.