The WBSC World Rankings is a ranking system for national teams in baseball and softball. The teams of the member nations of the World Baseball Softball Confederation (WBSC), baseball's world governing body, are ranked based on their tournament results with the most successful teams being ranked highest. A point system is used, with points being awarded based on the results of WBSC-recognized international tournaments. Under the existing system, rankings are based on a team's performance over the last four years, with major international tournaments awarded a higher weighting compared to minor international and continental tournaments.
Contents
History
In January 2009, the International Baseball Federation (IBAF) first published a listing in rank order of its member associations to provide a basis for comparison of the relative strengths of these teams. Though primarily focused on the respective men's senior teams of member nations, the current ranks also include points awarded based on results at the IBAF 'AAA' (Under 18) Junior and 'AA' (Under 16) Youth Championships held during the tracking period. Beginning in 2015, the rankings also determine which twelve teams participate in the WBSC Premier12 tournament.
Men's baseball rankings
For the current men's rankings, see chart at top of page and the WBSC website.
See footnote.Women's baseball rankings
For the current women's rankings, see chart and the WBSC website.
The initial women's baseball rankings were based upon results from past Women's Baseball World Cups. While the calculations of the women's rankings are similar to that of the men's, one main difference is that they are inclusive of the three most recent IBAF Women's Baseball World Cups whereas the men's rankings only include the last two. Points are weighted in favor of the more recent results.
Softball rankings
In the wake of the International Olympic Committee's decision to cut baseball from the 2012 Olympics program, the IBAF pushed the growth of women's baseball as to include a women's component in its bid for a reinstatement of the sport in future Olympics. The effort to unify the sports resulted in the merger of the IBAF with the International Softball Federation in 2013 to create the WBSC. As a result, the WBSC is also responsible for ranking international men's and women's softball teams.
Calculation method
Under the current system used, points are awarded to member nations based purely on their final position in recognised international tournaments. This is opposed to other international sports ranking systems such as the ICC Test Championship for cricket, that is based on both individual matches and the results of series, or the FIFA World Rankings for football, that is based solely on individual matches.
Points are awarded according to the following table:
The points awarded after 4th place are spread evenly in an attempt to ensure balance between tournaments with different-sized fields: finishing 6th out of 20 teams is considered to be a higher accomplishment than finishing 6th out of 8 teams. Given that points are not fixed beyond 4th place, a calculation is used to determine how many points are awarded to each position. The calculation gives the difference between any two consecutive positions from 4th through to last (e.g. 4th and 5th, 7th and 8th, 21st and 22nd, etc.). The calculation is:
This is illustrated in the following table:
A multiplier is used in awarding points, based on the prestige of the tournament and the quality of the teams involved. The table below reflects the changes in the international baseball schedule recently approved by the WBSC. Below are the multipliers that will be used beginning in 2012.
World Baseball Classic 6x (Winner receives 50 points, multiplied by 6 for a total of 300 points)
Premier 12 6x
WBC Qualifiers * (Pool winner receives 50 points, 2nd – 40 pts, 3rd – 30 pts, 4th – 15 pts)
21U and 18U 2x
15U and 12U 1x
Continental Championships, Continental Qualifiers, and all other WBSC-sponsored events will receive a multiplier based on the number of top-10 teams from the previous year-end rankings that are entered in the tournament. (See below)
1.00× - Continental Championships/Qualifying Tournaments, where 3 or more competing teams are in the previous year-end top 10
0.75× - Continental Championships/Qualifying Tournaments, where 2 competing teams are in the previous year-end top 10
0.50× - Continental Championships/Qualifying Tournaments, where 1 competing team is in the previous year-end top 10
0.25× - Continental Championships/Qualifying Tournaments, where no competing teams are in the previous year-end top 10
After each tournament where ranking points are awarded, the WBSC re-releases the ranking list with the points from the most recent tournament added, and points from tournaments more than four years old removed.