The Italian Baseball League (IBL, Italian: Campionato italiano di baseball), officially known as the Serie A (Italian pronunciation:[ˈsɛːrjeˈa]), is the top-level baseballleague in Italy. Founded in 1948, it is governed by the Italian Baseball & Softball Federation (FIBS), which has its headquarters in Rome.
Many of the teams are based in the northern Emilia-Romagna region of Italy, which has historically been the hotbed of baseball in the country; a team from the Republic of San Marino also plays in Serie A.
Like most professional sports leagues in Europe, and unlike professional baseball leagues in North America and Asia, the IBL uses a promotion and relegation system; the bottom five clubs are relegated to the Serie B minor league. Winners of the league are awarded a scudetto, and earn the right to represent Italy in the European Champions Cup.[a]
Until 2010, the IBL featured a promotion-and-relegation league format that demoted the last place finisher to the minor leagues (Series A2), while the Serie A2 (baseball) champion would be promoted into the IBL. This was changed in late 2009, when FIBS approved the decision to introduce a fixed-team franchise format (similar to that found in Major League Baseball) starting with the 2010 season.
However, in 2018, the promotion-and-relegation system was reintroduced.[1]
In 2021, the Italian Baseball League was rebranded as Serie A, bringing together the previous eight-team Serie A1 and the second-tier Serie A2. The new league was structured into 33 participating teams in 8 divisions, or gironi (lit. "groups"). The 8 gironi winners compete for the league championship (the scudetto), while the remaining 25 will fight to avoid being among the five relegated to Serie B.[2][3] In 2023, the league size was reduced to 30 teams, divided into five gironi; the top two in each group of the first phase (prima fase) advance to the poule scudetto (and then to the playoffs), while those not qualified fight to avoid relegation.
Teams
As is the practice in Asian baseball leagues like Japan's NPB and South Korea's KBO, many of the official team names in the Serie A include the team's corporate sponsor — though unlike Asian baseball, a sponsorship name does not necessarily indicate ownership.
2023 poule scudetto teams
Of the 33 teams participating in the 2023 Serie A season, ten qualified for the poule scudetto (the championship pool). The top eight teams in the poule scudetto qualify for the postseason.
Abraham Núñez: Outfielder for The Nettuno Baseball Club and retired Major League Baseball outfielder
Notes
^That is, for Italian clubs; San Marino BC automatically qualifies to play in the European Cup as the sole representative of the Republic of San Marino.
