2012 MLB Academies Tournament Preview – Czech Republic

Czech Baseball Association

The 5th annual 2012 MLB Academies Tournament will be played in Regensburg, Germany from March 31 to April 6 – the third consecutive year the event will be held at Armin Wolf Arena. The teams on hand will be Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium, France, Sweden, Italy, Czech Republic and Austria.
heinnews talked to the coaches in charge of the teams to get a run-down on what international baseball fans can expect from the tournament – and the future.
Czech coach David Winkler’s description of his team:

Looking over your roster, who do you see as some of your top players and maybe you can tell me a bit about those players and how high can they go in professional baseball?
Right now we have a really young team of academy players, but most of them have experience with national teams. Some of them were at the European championships for  juveniles and cadets and four of them last year for juniors last year. We also have a player that was in Tirenia (an MLB camp). I don’t want to say who is the best player because for me as a coach they have to work hard on themselves, and time will show what could happen.

Looking at this class(es) of players, where does it rank in past classes? Is this a particularly good or bad year for the system?
I think that we are not as strong as last year, but for sure we have bigger chances in the future because the players are more talented and they are working harder. Last year was great at the national level and the tournament in Regensburg is a great event. This will only help the players want to be better.

What players from your system would normally be here but are not and for what reason?
We have a couple players who are injured who would usually be in Regensburg.

What do you think about this MLB Academy tournament and others like it? What are the biggest benefits for the players?
MLB Academy tournamet is a great event as I said before. We will play six games against other academies. So we can learn a lot and find out new things. The coaches from the MLB system are great – so again we can gain a lot of new experiences, different ways how to play,  etc.,  So these are the biggest benefits for the players – new great, experiences and another view of how they can play, feel the game and find out what baseball can bring them and what they can give to baseball.

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Roster as of 21 March 2012

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