MLB follows NFL trend: set to announce first-ever London games - report
Major League Baseball appears to be following the lead of the NFL and NBA by bringing its sport to London.
MLB commissioner Rob Manfred and London Mayor Sadiq Khan are expected to hold a news conference Tuesday in which they will announce that MLB will play several games in London.
The teams set to compete in the first MLB games in the city are believed to be a pair of bitter American League East rivals: the New York Yankees and the Boston Red Sox.
The Associated Press reported that the Yankees and Red Sox will play two games next season at Olympic Stadium in London on June 29 and 30. The Red Sox will reportedly be the home team for this 2019 series.
Manfred indicated last May that the league was looking to bring the game overseas.
“It’s something we’d really like to do in 2019,” Manfred said at the time, according to CBS New York.
“I can’t tell you we are going to do it. I can’t give you a percentage, but we do think it’s time, whether it’s 2019 or shortly thereafter, that we play in Europe,” Manfred said.
In December 2016, Yankees team president Randy Levine said he’d love for the team to play in London.
“The Yankees have been at the forefront of suggesting that we bring the great game of baseball to London,” Levine told the Boston Herald.
“There have been some meaningful attempts to do so, and we are hopeful and confident that we can play there soon. Playing the Red Sox in London would be a special and unique event,” he added.
The Red Sox have long been on board, too.
“It would be great (to play the Yankees in London). We would really like to do it,” team president Sam Kennedy said.
The NFL has been playing games in London since 2007.
In 2018, the league will play three games in London: October 14 at Tottenham stadium, and October 21 and 28 at Wembley Stadium.
The NBA, meanwhile, has held regular season games in the British capital since 2011. This past year, the Celtics played the 76ers at The O2 Arena in London on Jan. 11.
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