BASEBALL IRELAND WELCOMES NEW IRISH AMBASSADOR - DAN ROONEY
Baseball Ireland welcomed the new US Ambassador to Ireland, Mr Dan Rooney, to an exhibition of baseball 'Irish Style' on July 4th in Dublin's Phoenix Park. Click the PHOTO at right to see some of the photos taken on the day.

Mr Rooney and his family have been tremendous contributors to Irish society for decades and Mr Rooney's appointment to Ireland is both great news and a well deserved honour.

SPARTANS ARE IRISH LEAGUE CHAMPIONS AGAIN!!!
The Spartans deservedly claimed their sixth Irish League Championship by beating the Dublin City Hurricanes 14-5 in the 'winner takes all' Final at Corkagh Park in Clondalkin on September 22, 2007. Led by terrific pitching and very timely hitting, the Spartans jumped out to an early lead that they never relinquished.

In the B-Leaue Final, the Mariners took home their first piece of League Silver by defeating the Hurricanes B-Club 14-13. Amazingly enough, the M's took an 11-0 lead after two innings but trailed 12-11 after the fourth! They reclaimed the lead with three runs in the fifth and held on to take the Title.

OKI PRAGUE INTERNATIONAL BASEBALL CUP
The Dublin Hurricanes represented Irish club baseball at the Tempo Titans annual invitational club tournament in Prague held the weekend of 30th June to 1st July. There were several club teams from the Czech Republic, a touring club from the USA and the Hurricanes in attendance. The Hurricanes showed just how far Irish club ball has come by going 2-1, only losing to the eventual tournament winners, Sabatt Praha, by a single run.

On Sunday, in the third place playoff, the Hurricanes overcame the host Tempo Titans in probably the best game of the tournament. Woody Woodburne scored on a single by Eoin O'Connor in the 9th inning as the game went two extra innings with the teams tied after the allotted time.

The highlight of the Hurricanes tournament? Undoubtedly, Rafael Diaz's opposite field three run home run in the game against Sabatt Praha. The Hurricanes also beat Czech side Aligátoři Znojmo on the Saturday, 15-3.

I want to thank the Knights for visiting and look forward to them coming back to next year's event. I also want to pay special thanks to Jason Nebenzahl, Eoin O'Connor and Brian Connolly for doing the organising of the tourney and keeping it on track the whole weekend.

IRELAND TAKE SILVER MEDAL AT EUROPEAN OLYMPIC QUALIFIER (2006)
The Irish National Team lost to Croatia 12 -2 in the European Championship Final on Saturday, August 5th, 2006 and in so doing laid claim as well deserving Silver Medalists.

Having only lost to Croatia and beaten the heavily favoured Belgians in the semi-final in one of the games of the tournament, Ireland again showed improvement and achieved their greatest ever accomplishment in European Championship competition.

At the end of the day, Croatia are deserved Champions. They only gave up eight runs for the entire tournament and down the stretch, they allowed just three runs in three games.

THE EMERALD DIAMOND WINS AWARD AT HALL OF FAME BASEBALL FILM FESTIVAL
The Emerald Diamond won the Critics Choice Award at The National Baseball Hall of Fame's Baseball Film Festival in Cooperstown, N.Y. which took place from November 10-12.

The award was selected and presented by NBC film critic Jeffrey Lyons. Lyons was amazed by the Irish National Team's perserverance, especially in the face of Dublin's notorious rain. "I'll never complain again about playing softball in April in Central Park in the New York Showbusiness League again," explained Lyons. "It was a wonderful story."

The juried competition featured 11 films that covered a wide variety of topics from Chicago Cubs great Ron Santo and his battle with diabetes (This Old Cub) to MLB's Dominican pioneers (The Republic of Baseball: The Dominican Giants of the American Game).

THE EMERALD DIAMOND DUBLIN SCREENING - A MASSIVE SUCCESS!!!

The Emerald Diamond screenings in the Sugar Club, Leeson Street, Dublin on Monday 24th & Tuesday 25th July was a tremendous success with both nights hosting standing room only. We'd like to thank all of you who attended and fully supported Irish Baseball.

The Emerald Diamond is an amazing feature-length documentary following the history of Baseball Ireland and the Irish National Baseball Team. Filming began in May 2004 and has continued in Dublin, Belfast, New York, Rhode Island, Los Angeles and Germany. The sold-out World Premiere took place on February 25th, 2006 at the prestigious Jacob Burns Film Center in Pleasantville, New York.

Check out www.theemeralddiamond.com website to see when this extraordinary story will be screened in your City.

IRELAND HOSTING OF GREAT BRITAIN JUNIOR NATIONAL TEAM A GREAT SUCCESS

Baseball Ireland hosted the Great Britain Junior National Team the weekend of May 12th & 13th at the National Baseball Facility in Corkagh Park, Clondalkin, Dublin. The highly touted GB Junior squad played in a specially formatted tournament against the Irish National Team and the infamous President's 9, a select All-Star team made up of players from the Irish League. Click to see the Tournament Schedule. Both teams gained tremndous experience during the weekend series which will bolster each squad's future plans. Baseball Ireland would like to thank GB for visiting and look forward to meeting their Senior counterparts later this summer.