{"id":26419,"date":"2019-11-08T16:59:42","date_gmt":"2019-11-08T21:59:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonbaseball.com\/?p=26419"},"modified":"2019-11-08T16:59:42","modified_gmt":"2019-11-08T21:59:42","slug":"max-kepler-baseball-germany","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/2019\/11\/08\/max-kepler-baseball-germany\/","title":{"rendered":"Minnesota Twins Max Kepler Raising Baseball Awareness in Germany"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonbaseball.com\/mlb-teams\/minnesota-twins\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Minnesota Twins<\/a> outfielder <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.baseball-reference.com\/players\/k\/keplema01.shtml?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Max Kepler<\/a><\/strong> is making an effort to help baseball grow globally. Kepler was born and raised in Berlin, Germany and he is taking it upon himself to travel around the country, during November, spreading baseball awareness.<\/p>\n<p>According to Jon Morosi, Kepler plans to visit Munich, Berlin, and Frankfurt. He also plans to work with 80 kids,, ages 12-14, at a clinic in Regensburg.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"550\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Great news for <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/MLB?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">@MLB<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/MLB_Players?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">@MLB_PLAYERS<\/a>, the <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/Twins?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">@Twins<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/DBV_BB_SB_GER?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">@DBV_BB_SB_GER<\/a>: Max Kepler will be in his native Germany this month to spread awareness for baseball and visit Munich, Berlin and Frankfurt before working with 80 players, ages 12 to 14, at a clinic in Regensburg. <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/baseballeurope?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">@BaseballEurope<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&mdash; Jon Morosi (@jonmorosi) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/jonmorosi\/status\/1192834757194928128?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">November 8, 2019<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<h2>Global Growth<\/h2>\n<p>Kepler&#8217;s actions come at a time when MLB is attempting to expand its global popularity and look for the next generation of superstar players and die-hard fans. Over the last five seasons, the league has <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mlb.com\/news\/baseball-games-played-outside-the-us-c272441130\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">played regular-season games<\/a> in Australia, Japan, Mexico, and England.<\/p>\n<p>The London Series was launched in 2019 featuring the <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonbaseball.com\/mlb-teams\/new-york-yankees\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">New York Yankees<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonbaseball.com\/mlb-teams\/boston-red-sox\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Boston Red Sox<\/a> and it will continue in 2020 with the <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonbaseball.com\/mlb-teams\/chicago-cubs\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Chicago Cubs<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonbaseball.com\/mlb-teams\/st-louis-cardinals\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">St. Louis Cardinals<\/a> playing each other.<\/p>\n<p>MLB has set its sights on <a href=\"https:\/\/www.baseballamerica.com\/stories\/mlb-sets-sights-on-new-markets-in-india-europe\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">growing in Europe<\/a> as well as India. From a business standpoint, the idea is to grow the game by attracting players from these countries to play MLB.\u00a0 After that, the objective would be to work on televising games in those markets.<\/p>\n<h2>Germany and Baseball<\/h2>\n<p>Max Kepler is one of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.baseball-reference.com\/bio\/Germany_born.shtml\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">42 German-born<\/a> men to play in MLB. Clearly, he would love to see his home country produce more baseball talent then it has historically.<\/p>\n<p>Aside from Kepler, some of the more notable names on that list include <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.baseball-reference.com\/players\/g\/gardero01.shtml?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Ron Gardenhire<\/a><\/strong> and <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.baseball-reference.com\/players\/j\/jacksed01.shtml?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Edwin Jackson<\/a><\/strong>. Gardenhire currently manages the <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonbaseball.com\/mlb-teams\/detroit-tigers\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Detroit Tigers<\/a> and has won 1,068 games as a manager. Jackson has pitched for 17 seasons from 2003-2019 with 14 different franchises. He also threw a no-hitter in 2010.<\/p>\n<p>Germany has <a href=\"https:\/\/www.baseball-reference.com\/bullpen\/World_Baseball_Classic\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">failed to qualify<\/a> for the world Baseball Classic in each of the four times the tournament has occurred since 2006. Their bid for the 2017 World Baseball Classic fell short after a 15-3 loss to the Czech Republic in a 2016 qualifying game.<\/p>\n<p>It will take time for the popularity of baseball to grow in Europe, but Kepler is taking a step in the right direction with his tour around Germany.<\/p>\n<p>Main Photo: <a id=\"bHeAOc_IRD5oqOlT1gD-_w\" class=\"gie-single\" style=\"color: #a7a7a7; text-decoration: none; font-weight: normal !important; border: none; display: inline-block;\" href=\"http:\/\/www.gettyimages.com\/detail\/1182505158\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Embed from Getty Images<\/a><script>window.gie=window.gie||function(c){(gie.q=gie.q||[]).push(c)};gie(function(){gie.widgets.load({id:'bHeAOc_IRD5oqOlT1gD-_w',sig:'Ih7uqfRaJVLB9gtGtbMv2umOf2tU9nIPrSKmZl7HOjQ=',w:'594px',h:'396px',items:'1182505158',caption: true ,tld:'com',is360: false })});<\/script><script src='\/\/embed-cdn.gettyimages.com\/widgets.js' charset='utf-8' async><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Minnesota Twins outfielder Max Kepler is making an effort to help baseball grow globally. Kepler was born and raised in Berlin, Germany and he is taking it upon himself to travel around the country, during November, spreading baseball awareness. According to Jon Morosi, Kepler plans to visit Munich, Berlin, and Frankfurt. He also plans to [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2758,"featured_media":26421,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[2,13,1071],"tags":[511],"class_list":["post-26419","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-featured","category-twins","category-mlb","tag-max-kepler"],"modified_by":"DJ Kleinbard","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26419","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2758"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=26419"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26419\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/26421"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=26419"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=26419"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=26419"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}