About Australia

Baseball History

Baseball in Australia has a long and rich history. Even though it's a relatively minor sport in the big picture, it's played with passion and an extraordinarily high degree of skill, as evidenced by the number of young Australians drafted each year to the American MLB farm system, and the country's performance in senior international competition:- out of all proportion to our population. There are now over a hundred Australians making their living from playing the sport internationally.

THE EARLY HISTORY OF AUSTRALIAN BASEBALL

Excerpts from Time and Game: The History of Australian Baseball By Joe Clark

The man who credits himself with bringing baseball to Australia was Samuel Perkins Lord (1819-1890), an American merchant who arrived in Melbourne on his own ship, The City of Norfolk on 4 September 1853. Lord was originally from Portsmouth, New Hampshire and probably played the New York Game and found numerous other Americans of like mind when he arrived in Melbourne at the age of 33 after the death of his first wife in 1852. It appears that Lord made numerous efforts to organise baseball in Melbourne but either his business interests or the lack of enthusiasm of Australians for the game kept baseball from succeeding until Spalding’s visit.

Australian baseball’s official creation myth states that American miners played baseball on the goldfields of Ballarat on their rest days in 1857. While it is possible such games took place, no original documentation has ever been found for a Ballarat game. The earliest reference linking Australian baseball with the Victorian gold fields is from 1918 while many 19th century references place the first games in Melbourne.

Victorian baseball really started in 1879 with the formation of the St.Kilda Baseball Club. It appears that the St. Kilda Cricket Club wanted to give some competition to a touring American Negro music troupe - the “Georgia Minstrels”. They played several games at Jolimont and had some lively parties.

Baseball was played off and on in Australia for six years after 1879. It was accepted as a sport among cricketers and American residents, but could not even start to compete with cricket, boxing, rowing, AFL, cycling and horseracing. There was talk of forming clubs with an association but nothing came of it until 1882. In 1882, a group of men from America and Canada got together to try and form a club. The result was the “Union Base Ball Club”. The “Unions” played several matches which included a series against another American minstrel troupe known as the “Lewis Mastadon Minstrels”. As with St Kilda, this club did not last longer than the series against the “Mastodons”. In 1886, former members of the “Unions” got together to try and organise baseball in Sydney. This meeting called itself the ‘New South Wales Baseball Association".

The NSWBA played its first game at Moore Park a week later on February 13, 1886. The players in these two teams then formed the Sydney and Union Base-Ball Clubs.

Next year, 1887, another meeting was called which was attended by nine members of the old NSWBA to reorganise the competition. An American ship called the Mariposa visited Sydney and the NSWBA organised a game with its crew. The Mariposa won the match 11-8. A NSWBA club match was then organised and two sides, Sydney and Union, again, to play each other. A tie resulted from a match at Moore Park on 12/6/1887. The Herald says their performance was disappointing. “It is evident that the Sydney players must attend their practices more than they do if they wish to win the first Intercolonial match...” Apparently, there was talk to organising a match with Victoria, but nothing came of it. 1887 spelled the end for the NSWBA. Some of the players re-emerge later after 1888, but for many expatriate Americans and Australian cricketers, 1887 was the end of their five year flirtation with the new American game.

The Spalding Tour: 1888-1889

More excerpts from Time and Game: The History of Australian Baseball By Joe Clark. 

Read the complete text of this story here.

The Spalding Tour was the event which brought baseball to Australia. It introduced the nation to the game that seemed forever destined to live in the shadow of cricket. It was big and brash, expensive and lavish - the Spalding Tour was all of the things that other nations expected of Americans. Albert Spalding (1850-1915) had been a successful baseball player during the formative years of the sport. By the time of his famous tour, he was a team owner, a baseball entrepreneur and a sporting goods businessman. According to the English-born baseball journalist, Henry Chadwick, the Spalding Tour of 1888 was the "great event in the modern history of athletic sports"

As a leading player and later, manager, Spalding was so convinced that the world would turn to baseball that he took the entire Boston team to England in 1874. He gained some support there for the sport, even a match at Lord's. This baseball tour also had the distinction of beating a top rated cricket team at cricket. The English were polite but reserved in their enthusiasm for the new American game.

Spalding always denied he was trying to displace cricket in Britain and Australia. He only wanted to make it "one of the kindred field sports of the country. The reader cannot help but think that Spalding was showing his true feelings when he noted: "Baseball is a sport for the masses, cricket for the leisure classes. Baseball takes 2-3 hours, cricket takes 2-3 days. Spalding also was concerned that, with the development of team sports, there seemed to be few sports in common between the major English speaking countries such as Canada, America, Britain, Australia and New Zealand.

In 1876, Spalding left Boston to become captain and manager of the Chicago Baseball Club. In the same year he founded A.G.Spalding and Brothers which became one of the leading manufacturers of sporting goods and still controls a large share of the market. By 1886 this business had made him very wealthy.

Australia’s centenary celebrations in 1888 attracted Spalding’s interest. He decided to introduce baseball to what appeared to be a developing western country. His success in the sport, and in the business of selling sporting equipment, gave him the means for the famous world tour of 1888.

It seems that it was a combination of motives which led Spalding to embark upon this unusual enterprise; for financial speculation, adventure, curiosity, nationalism, sport interest and competition against the English.

Consider that the game that Spalding was bringing to Australia was still developing, being less than 50 years old. It was a new game, a new phenomenon, a new fad from America, having a similar impact on the nation as computer games or the latest music trend might today. Some members of the Spalding Tour were old enough to remember a time in America when there had been no baseball, and cricket was America's bat and ball game.

On the other hand, Australia of the 1880s was not under the powerful sway and influence of American technology and entertainment as it is today. If such influence had been present, then baseball, and not cricket, could be the summer game of Australia. Still, American social and business influence was increasing steadily. Australians saw America as an emerging colonial power and economic force in the world, but far different from the ubiquitous America we know today. Despite its shine, the Spalding Tour should not be viewed as "the latest thing" from America. It was a unique occurrence in the Australian sporting and social calendar of the 1880s, bringing modern sporting trends from the second leading English-speaking nation of the world to a group of prosperous British colonies in the midst of economic boom. The primary influence upon Australia in the 19th century was Britain. This was reflected in virtually every aspect of Australian culture, but most directly in the ball game that Australia chose as its own. Cricket was British culture in Australia. It was the game of the common Australian man, regardless of class or circumstances. Furthermore, it was a clear indication of the significance of cricket for both British and Australian nationalism. It was going to be difficult, if not impossible, for Spalding and his tour to supplant British cricket in Australia with a new phenomena based on rounders developed in America. Spalding acknowledged this from the beginning and wisely promoted American baseball as a complement to Australian/British cricket.

Current Structure of Baseball in Sydney

Although this page is headed "Australian baseball", the teams participating in this tournament come from the Sydney Metropolitan area. Therefore, we'll concern ourselves with baseball in Sydney, and in national terms from a Sydney perspective...

	Starting out - teeball. There are about 100 clubs in the Sydney basin which offer modified forms of the game to children as young as 4. The emphasis is on fun, fitness and participation.
	Junior Club baseball is offered for those aged 11 up to 16, both boys and girls. There are over 600 teams competing in graded divisions. Baseball is generally played as a summer sport in Sydney.
	The Hills Junior Baseball Association also runs competitions in winter.
	Representative baseball is played in U/12, U/14 and U/16 age-groups, with teams entered from each of the nine Sydney Associations, each comprising from four to twelve clubs.
	Within NSW, but outside of Sydney, the sport is run by NSW Country Baseball. They have 14 Associations made up from about 90 clubs, covering a land area roughly twice that of California.
	The top two teams from Sydney play the top two teams from NSW Country each year, seeking the CvC Shield. The inaugural event was run in April 2006.
	Of the nine Sydney Junior Associations, seven are members of NSWJBL, and are able to offer their members up to six international tours each year, to fixtures in Asia, North & South America, and Europe.
	Membership of NSWJBL also gains access to the extensive IBA International Tournament Schedule in several age-groups, of which the 2006 Pan Pacific Championships are one example.
	For those junior players who remain at school, the CHS (Combined High School) programme is an option. Teams are selected from dozens of high schools in four regions, covering both public and private schools.
	From the CHS programme, both State and [ultimately] National teams are selected. Games are played locally in autumn {fall} and the National team competes later in the Northern summer in various events.
	The peak local body is Baseball NSW, who run the elite programmes and select teams to compete in the National Championships, held around Australia in January of each year in U/14, U/16 and U/18 age-groups.
	The Australian peak body controlling baseball is the Australian Baseball Federation (ABF). It oversees the conduct and development of the sport at all levels.
	The ABF also runs the Australian Baseball Academy, a programme which seeks to identify players capable of participating in both international tournaments and professional baseball.
	A precursor to a player's place in the Academy is selection by their local State Institute of Sport. Within NSW, this programme is NSWIS.
	As the junior players become adults, they have several choices. In summer, the elite will generally end up in one of ten Major League clubs, which nominates U/18, 3rd, 2nd and 1st Grade teams.
	In winter, those elite players have a choice of nine Winter League clubs. This league offers three grades and plays on Sundays between April and August each year.
	For the non-elite players, or those who just want to play rather than spend their weeks training, there are several Leagues in the Sydney area. The one affiliated with BNSW and the ABF is Pacific Coast.
	For a more relaxed (and far cheaper) League, Sydney Metro operates throughout Sydney and provides a high-quality environment without the formality associated with ABF affiliation.
	Girls also have competitions designed to meet demand as they grow beyond the Junior framework. For a low-key weekend social game, the Sydney Women's League is a choice that many will make.
	For those girls who want to play weeknights, and those who have elite goals, the NSW Womens' League will be their destination of choice, with 16 club teams this year.
	Australia is a member of the International Baseball Federation, made up of countries outside of the US Major League catchment. This provides access to international senior tournaments.
	The pinnacle of achievement for a senior Australian player is selection in one of the State teams that contest the Claxton Shield (senior national championship) in January of each year.
	The penultimate step in baseball is selection in the Australian team to contest both IBAF sanctioned events and the Olympics in Beijing in 2008. Sadly, baseball has been dropped (for now) from the 2012 Olympics
	Finally, those players who go "all the way" will end up in the US Major Leagues. As of now, 22 Australians have made it to "The Show"

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