Tokyo gets Olympics; decision on baseball to come next - MLB

Those wanting baseball and softball back in the Olympics got the news they were looking for Saturday: Tokyo was named the host city for the 2020 games, beating out Istanbul in a runoff after Madrid was eliminated earlier in the afternoon.

The decision on whether to add baseball and softball, squash or wrestling to the Olympic program for 2020 will come Sunday. Given the popularity of the sports in each region, wrestling seemed an obvious choice for an Istanbul games, while baseball makes a ton of sense in Japan. Of course, this being the IOC, we shouldn’t trust common sense dictating what gets played. According to Nick Zaccardi, wrestling was viewed as the heavy favorite to get the nod going into today’s decision.

It won’t happen, but I’d say put both in. Taking wrestling out of the Olympics was a crazy idea in the first place, and while baseball may be less of an Olympic tradition, it will no doubt play to packed houses (that already exist and wouldn’t have to be built) in a country that loves the sport.

Roger Clemens will be an analyst for ESPN when the defending World Series champion Houston Astros host the Chicago White Sox on opening day.

Clemens made four appearances on last year’s KayRod Cast with Michael Kay and Alex Rodriguez. He will be stepping in on March 30 for David Cone, who will be doing the New York Yankees opener against the San Francisco Giants on YES Network.

“Roger has been sort of a friend of ours for the last year, so to speak, he’s in. He’s been engaged, knowledgeable and really present,” said ESPN Vice President of Production Phil Orlins. “You know, whatever past may be, he’s still tremendously engaged and he really brought that every time he was with us.”

Clemens was a seven-time Cy Young winner but his career after baseball has been tainted by allegations of performance-enhancing drug use. He is a Houston native and pitched for the Astros for three seasons.

Orlins said that with the rules changes and pitch clock, it is important to have a pitcher in the booth with Karl Ravech and Eduardo Perez.

“We don’t feel like we have to have the dynamic of Eduardo with a pitcher, but we certainly think that works. Throw in the added factor of rule changes and it is better to have a batter-pitcher perspective,” Orlins said.

Orlins did not say if this would open the door for future opportunities for Clemens as an ESPN analyst.