Team USA prepares for Olympic Bid

You may remember the exciting championship run by Team USA in during the most recent World Baseball Classic, and for good reason. That team included major league all-stars like Brandon Crawford, Adam Jones, Paul Goldschmidt, Christian Yelich, Andrew McCutchen, and Sonny Gray. They had dramatic victories over Dominican Republic and Puerto Rico en route to the title. If that team or a similar one was rebuilt for this year's Olympics in Tokyo, it would be a foregone conclusion that they'd be favorites to repeat.

However, the Olympic tournament will be different for many reasons. For starters, only players not currently on MLB 40-man rosters will be eligible to participate. In addition, the field will be much smaller with only six teams competing this summer. So far, four nations have already qualified: Japan, South Korea, Mexico and Israel.

This year's USA squad will contain a motley crew of players with different pedigrees. On one hand, there's former Major League contributors like Todd Frazier and Matt Kemp that aren't currently on rosters. On the other hand, there's exciting young prospects like Boston's Jarren Duran and Triston Casas.

As of Thursday, they have advanced to the final “Super Round” of the WBSC Baseball Americas Qualifier, along with Venezuela, Canada and the Dominican Republic. The tournament will conclude Saturday in Palm Beach and Port St. Lucie, Florida. For now, it looks like they have a good shot to make the Games, however a similar squad was upset last fall by Mexico in the Premier12 tournament which would have given them a berth.

While it might not be as exciting as the team or tournament four years ago, it's still encouraging to see baseball back in the Olympics, where it has been absent since 2008.