I agree, the World Cup and soccer in general wipes baseball off the map. The WBC was advertised all over and the games were on national TV. There weren't as many countries in it, nor were there as many countries with a chance to qualify, still rosters from the Dominican Republic and Venezuala featured as much star power as the U.S. Japan had a couple of its stars playing in MLB, but basically put on a show (and won it) with the pros playing in the very competitive Japanese baseball league. S. Korea turned heads and so did Cuba (who everyone thought, while Cuban baseball used to be legendary, was now in shambles). It was received very well. You probably didnt notice because you dont like baseball.

I watched a lot of matches this weekend...they were awesome. It's so exciting and so competitive. I think it really is the world's sport. It is the World Cup and certainly is worthy of being the world title. What about the gold at the Olympics though? Also, here in the U.S. we have basically no exposure to the highly competitive professional leagues that these guys spend the majority of their time playing in. I don't think it's that bad that its called the World Series and that the winning team are World Champions. The most competitive baseball league in the world is the MLB. The best baseball players in the world play in the MLB. Doesn't seem like a stretch to me, even though baseball doesn't claim a list of countries quite near the list for soccer.

Go U.S.!
Go Italy!

Otherwise we don't advance