Tell Tel Aviv: Mighty baseball has struck out!

Another day... another supposedly cutting edge blogger a year behind the times and spewing a mishmash of factoids when it comes to the major international saga of baseball in Israel. What are we missing here? What are folks in Israel missing? Why is the "mainstream" media allowing so many people to avoid the fact that there will be no professional baseball in Israel in 2008? Months after we'd predicted it, weeks after it was confirmed, promotional websites with misleading information, league websites with information well past its sell date, and uninformed well-intentioned sports fans are leading millions of sports fan to miss the entire cycle of news broken by Our Man Elli in Israel.

The latest is on the Real Tel Aviv blogsite ("the real deal on Tel Aviv," "the best blog about Tel Aviv!!"), which this morning offers a "guest post by Chick Chick" entitled "Top 5 Tel Aviv Spectator Sports."

"Israelis are HUGE sport fans - We’ll give our heart and soul for our local teams, and we love and cheer our national teams like crazy. Tel Aviv sports the country’s hottest teams and best stadiums, and also hosts most of the national sporting events. This makes it the perfect place to get a taste of the Israeli sports scene!!"

Chick Chick offers four top sporting events of the future:

Maccabi Tel Aviv Euroleague Basketball at Nokia Arena

The Tel Aviv Football Derby at Bloomfield Stadium

World Cup 2010 Qualifying Round at Ramat Gan Stadium

International Tennis in the Ramat Hashron


Fair enough. But then he/she had to go and add a "Bonus” :

Bonus: Israeli Baseball League 
If you talk to a typical Israeli about baseball, he will laugh and wonder why you are interested in that stupid game with the sticks and chubby players. But since Israelis come from all over the world, some American born citizens have been able to slip this long time tradition into the holy land. In November 2007, a few Jewish-American investors announced the Israeli Baseball League, a professional league with 6 teams with names that automatically bring a smile to your face, like the Raanana Express, the Petach Tikva Pioneers, and the 2007 champions - the Bet Shemesh Blue Sox. The league has a eight week, 45 game season that takes place during July and August. If you want to catch this up and coming league in Tel Aviv, your best bet is to see the Tel Aviv Lightning or the Netanya Tigers, who both play in the Sportek Baseball Field, in the Western end of Park Hayarkon, a short walk from most of Tel Aviv’s seaside hotels. You might catch some of Major League Baseball’s future stars - in 2008, eight ILB players were signed to minor league contracts in the United States. So play ball!!!

Play ball!!!??? Chickie, baby, not this year...