From Little League to Team Israel, baseball takes root across the country

More than 100 children from 11 Israeli cities gathered in Tel Aviv for the first-ever Under-12 National Baseball Tournament, a milestone for a sport that is still expanding across the country.

Games took place simultaneously on four fields on July 9 and 10. Efrat defeated Modiin in the final at Sportek Field in Hayarkon Park, but the tournament’s importance extended beyond the result. Nine teams from communities including Jerusalem, Tel Aviv, Ra’anana, Misgav, Efrat, Modiin, Beit Shemesh and Bat Hefer took part.

The event also brought together clubs at different stages of development. Misgav and Efrat had existed for years but met for the first time at the tournament. Karmey Gat fielded an emerging team, while Beersheba’s young team was started by Jonathan Leiman, a baseball-loving father and Baltimore Orioles fan who wanted his children to embrace the sport.

Boys and girls spent the two days playing, watching games and socializing. Organizers scheduled the championship game early on Friday so families observing Shabbat could return home in time. Parents, many of them immigrants from the United States, said baseball helped their children settle into life in Israel by connecting them with other families who shared the sport.

Israeli baseball now offers programs for players from age five through international competition, including the World Baseball Classic. For many Jewish baseball fans worldwide, the country’s team is best known for its appearances at that tournament and on the Olympic stage. The youth tournament showed the sport developing at a local level, with teams forming in communities across Israel.