(Story by Marco Stoovelaar; Photos by Henk Seppen & WBSC)
  Bahamas wins Co-Ed Slow Pitch World Cup; former player Amsterdam Pirates plays for Curaçao
Nederlands
 PLANT CITY, Florida (USA) -
The Bahamas have won the fourth Co-Ed Slow Pitch World Cup, which was held at the Randy Larson Softball Four-plex in Plant City (USA), November 19-22.
The Bahamas was awarded the Gold Medal after the final against Germany had to be halted due to heavy rain.
The first and second edition of the World Cup were held in 2002 and 2005, but is is now the aim of making it an annual event.
In 2002, there was a Men's Division and a Co-Ed Division.
The US Batters Choice win the men's tournament, while Great Britain II won the gold in the co-ed tournament.
In this last event, two 'national' teams from Great Britain and three club-teams from the Bahamas formed the 5-team co-ed tournament.
Participating in the men's tournament were two 'national' teams from Great Britain, three club-teams from the Bahamas and one club-team from the USA.
In 2005, there only was a Co-Ed World Cup.
That was won by Clan Softball Club from Scotland.
Also participating were 'national' teams from Great Britain (two) and the Cayman Islands, plus club-teams from the Bahamas (two), Ireland (one) and the USA (two).
As only a few countries participated in the first two events and the games were not well-visited, it took more than eight years for the next World Cup to be organized.
This time, there was much more interest and several countries were represented.
In January 2014, the third Co-Ed Slow Pitch World Cup was held, which then was won by USA Ink Daddyz.
Great Britain ended in second place.
Participating then were teams from the Bulgaria, Canada, Curaçao, France, Great Britain, Turks & Caicos Islands and two club-teams from the USA.
...Zair Koeiman participated with Curaçao...
(© Photo: Henk Seppen) |
In the fourth edition of the Co-Ed World Cup, a team-roster could have a maximum of 20 players, but with no fewer that five being of one gender.
The tournament was open to both national and club co-ed teams with no nationality requirements.
The aim is to eventually organize a World Championship Slow Pitch for national teams.
Slow pitch is being played by an estimated 40 million athletes worldwide in over 140 countries.
Eight co-ed slow pitch teams participated in the fourth World Cup, which was organized again by the Softball Division of the WBSC (the former ISF).
Like the previous three World Cups, the event was held again in Plant City.
Four of these teams came from Europe, being Bulgaria, France, Germany and Great Britain.
The other teams came from the Bahamas, Canada, Curaçao and the Turks & Caicos Islands.
There were some familiar names amongst the participants.
Playing for Curaçao was Zair Koeiman, who played baseball in the Dutch big league for L&D Amsterdam Pirates through the 2010 season.
In 2008, he won the Dutch championship with Amsterdam and in 2009, he participated in the World Port Tournament with the Netherlands National Baseball Team.
He also played college-baseball for three seasons since 2012.
Participating as players were international umpires Benjamin Milgrom (France) and Axel Vogel (Germany).
There were two European umpires in this event, Ralf-Jürgen Rex (Germany) and James O'Farrell (Ireland).
In the round-robin, the team from the Bahamas proved to be the strongest, winning six of their seven games.
The team opened the event with a 17-2 win vs. Bulgaria, then nipped Germany 12-11.
The Bahamas started the next day with a win vs. France (15-5), but then lost 9-7 to Great Britain.
It closed Day 2 with another small win vs. Canada (7-6).
On the final day of the preliminary round, the Bahamas won vs. Curaçao (17-4) and Turks & Caicos (18-8) to finish in first place.
Germany was the best European squad in the preliminary round, finishing in second place.
The Germans won vs. France (36-3), Turks & Caicos (17-6), Bulgaria (13-5), Great Britain (17-5) and Curaçao (16-5), but lost to the Bahamas (12-11) and Canada (20-10).
...The Gold Medal is handed out to the Bahamas...
(© Photo courtesy of WBSC) |
Initially, the British squad was a favorite to reach the final.
In August of this year, in Dupnitsa (Bulgaria), Great Britain captured its 10th consecutive European Co-Ed Championship-title, while Germany then finished in third place.
In Florida, the British team won its first two games vs. Turks & Caicos (19-5) and France (29-1) on the first day, but then was left empty-handed on Day 2 vs. Curaçao (13-10) and Germany (17-5).
In the middle of the two losses, Great Britain handed the Bahamas its lone loss (9-7).
Great Britain then closed the prelimimary round on Day 3 winning vs. Bulgaria (18-6) and Canada (18-17) to finish in third place.
In the first semi-final game, Great Britain faced Canada, which had finished in fourth place.
Canada won 22-7 to eliminate Great Britain and qualify for the Bronze Medal Game (or backdoor game).
In the other semi-final, the Bahamas won 15-10 vs. Germany to become the first finalist.
In the Bronze Medal Game, Germany initially trailed 6-0 in the first inning vs. Canada, but staged a surprising comeback and won 11-10 to become the second finalist.
With that, Canada won the Bronze Medal.
The all-deciding Final between the Bahamas and Germany was bothered by heavy rain.
The game went underway on a wet field, but was halted after three innings, as more rain made the field unplayable.
It was impossible to resume the game in which Germany had taken the lead.
The Bahamas then was awarded first place and thus the World Championship-title, based on their win in the semi-final as the number one seed.
For the first time, there also was a Homerun Contest, featuring two batters from each team.
The Homerun Contest for women was won by Ericka Carter (Turks & Caicos), with Filipina Ovnarska (Bulgaria) and Wendy Hart (France) finishing in second place.
The men contest was won by Richene Martina (Curaçao), followed by Eugene Bien (Bahamas).
The World Cup was held in conjunction with the city's annual Pig Jam, which offered players, coaches, staff-members, officials and spectators a lot of food and entertainment.
During the 13th Annual Suncoast Credit Union Plant City Pig Jam State BBQ Championship, individuals competed in the professional and amateurs' barbeque competition.
Final Standings 4th World Cup
1. Bahamas, 2 Germany, 3. Canada, 4. Great Britain, 5. Turks & Caicos Islands, 6. Curaçao, 7. Bulgaria, 8. France.
(November 30)
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