Take me out to the ballgame

Earlier we had reported that America's favorite pastime might soon be making its Chinese debut and now it's official. The China Series 2008, as its being called, will feature two games between the Los Angeles Dodgers and the San Diego Padres on March 15-16. The games will be held at Beijing's Wukesong Baseball Field, which will also be used for the upcoming Olympics. No word yet on when tickets will be available or how much they will be.

It's a well-known fact that China has not yet been able to put together a serious threat to Japan's east-Asian baseball supremacy. But maybe these games will get the ball rolling. In fact, the LA Times is reporting that this is all part of a concerted MLB effort to produce an army of 100,000 Chinese baseball-hungry zombies to take over the world. Well perhaps that's a bit of an exaggeration, but who wouldn't want to get in on China's sports market in the same lucrative way that the NBA has.

We might have to wait a while before the Middle Kingdom produces a baseball monster on the level of Yao Ming, because the search has been on for years now. So, in the meantime, they'll have to get creative. Maybe America could export a few farm-league players or aging veterans. At the very least, someone could call Tom Selleck and try to arrange for a sequel to Mr. Baseball.

So that's two more American ballgames in the bag. 1,000 more and we can throw our Filipino satellite away.