Mack’s Mets Notes has an interesting post about a foreign source for MLB prospects, Australia:
Of the 30 MLB clubs, 18 have scouts here in Australia and a number have been very active.; The Twins are the most active here with 14 Aussies at the moment and have had considerable success at getting Aussies to the Majors – Balfour; Brad Thomas; Nakamura and have Oeltjen in the Futures game this year. A total of 23 Aussies have reached the Major League.
The Padres and the Phillies are also now very active as well as the Braves. The Mariners have had two [Snelling; Blackley] get to the Majors and this year the Braves have two Aussie rookies in the bigs in Moylan and Stockman
And there are plenty of reasons that MLB is interested in the Aussies:
Australians are well coached – athletic and hard working. They are drug free and understand the language and culture of the US. That makes them valuable recruits. Aussies are also pretty assertive [even aggressive] in the way they play sports and that is attractive to MLB clubs. Australia has a very sophisticated Talent Identification program for all sports and baseball is no exception. So any player of talent is soon identified and enters one the State based Elite Institutes whilst playing in annual National Tournaments at the U14;U16 & U18 levels as well as a high standard Senior National Tournament that is also heavily scouted. The top prospects in the country are sent on a two month intensive program at the MLB funded Academy on the Gold Coast in Queensland. It is identical to spring training and does a great job in preparing players for pro ball.
So don’t be surprised if you hear Australian accents coming out of the dugout.
The weird thing is that the Aussies did terribly in the recent international baseball tournament which I believe Japan won. They were eliminated early.
Some said that the Australians were suffering from jet lag, but there really was no good explanation. Jet lag from Japan would have been about the same as that from Australia.
Australia is the top country in the world right now in cricket. It is a major force in rugby. Baseball is low on the list. It may be that the pool of young Australians playing baseball is too small to be competitive with a country like Japan where baseball is a major sport.
Thanks much for your kind words.
Mack