The IBAF (International Baseball Federation) has a list of World Rankings for baseball, but that is a list for the production of national teams- not how successful a baseball country is at producing MLB players, or producing the best MLB players. Nor does it take into account how well teams from those countries do in competitions like the Caribbean Series.

The Continuum Baseball Rankings do that differently. Using an ELO rating system, the Continuum Rankings takes into account a few factors:

1. The IBAF rankings (NOTE: THIS IS NO LONGER TRUE AS OF LATE 2014)

2. The amount of MLB players produced (NOTE: THIS IS NO LONGER TRUE AS OF 2014)

3. The amount of win shares of MLB players by country (NOTE: THIS IS NO LONGER TRUE AS OF 2014)

4. Game results by both national teams and representative teams (such as a league champion in the Caribbean Series), as well as overall tournament performance (coming in first in a tournament, for example, versus coming in third or fourth).

Now, here’s how ELO Rankings work: each team has a rating (originally all the teams had their rating set as 0, but after running the first 3 parts of the rankings I used the rankings it produced for the first tournament covered with the Continuum Baseball Rankings- the Caribbean World Series). Based on how high or low one team’s ranking is compared to another, the winner or loser of a game is awarded anywhere from 0 to 15 points OR loses 0 to 15 points. The number of points awarded depends on the quality of the two teams. More impressive wins get more points, for example.

Note that the following rankings are just for fun, they are not scientific and are not meant to be definitive whatsoever. I have no background in statistics, and my knowledge on the ELO ranking system comes entirely from reading about it and such. Even the math itself was done using another website, not a personal calculator or spreadsheet.

Also, note that I counted just the Netherlands (and added together Netherlands, Curacao, Aruba. etc. into one for the Win Shares and Number of Players) for this, not each of the countries in the Kingdom of the Netherlands individually, just for simplicity.

BASEBALL CONTINUUM RANKINGS AS OF DEC. 29 AFTER 2014 CENTRAL AMERICAN AND CARIBBEAN GAMES (previous placement noted in parenthesis when different):

1.USA 356.072998689

2.Japan 340.60430423

3.Cuba 323.02107313472 (4)

4.Dominican Republic 297.35238812281 (3)

5. Netherlands 275.75503976547

6.Taipei 261.97398601937

7.Puerto Rico 230.65210999609

8.Canada 221.291148645
9. Korea 220.35663715622

10.Venezuela 171.3467905824

11. Italy 170.70692129221

12.Mexico 130.95391549169

13.Panama 88.953789274824

14.Nicaragua 83.014039023317 (18)

15.Australia 82.3756337603 (14)

16.Colombia 60.4698693683 (15)

17.Brazil 59.8168005729 (16)

18. Spain 48.403297343138 (17)

19.China 0.62170545744473

20. Germany -0.028543438214717

21.Pakistan -40.511528387498

22.Argentina -49.5976341618

23.Philippines -60.1831994271

24.Thailand -98.244139529408

25. Czech Republic -105.10378912265

26.Israel -106.31847810509

27.Great Britain -124.8770136378

28.New Zealand -150.690146917

29.Sri Lanka -183.131130568

30. France -188.29700056625

31.South Africa -191.112252876

32.Hong Kong -203.89484741574

33.Afghanistan -244.125590861

34. Russia -263.79406777846

35.Indonesia -264.99396798

36.Austria -295.190503818

37.Ukraine -310.387960257

38. Croatia -324.45557142313

39.Guam -329.861338136

40.Nepal -353.138578515

41.Bulgaria -357.622894242

42.Lithuania -380.098754586

43.Guatemala -384.29410562585 (NEW)

44.Switzerland -392.468931222 (43)

45.Slovakia -406.776541519 (44)

46.Poland -420.869348451 (45)

47.Belarus -432.207739417 (46)

48. Slovenia -437.37168583471 (47)

49.Ireland -443.88628955372 (48)

50.Romania -458.21222918015 (49)

51. Belgium -469.10088300531 (50)

52.Finland -484.05281749415 (51)

53.Mongolia -488.30181330038 (52)

54.Latvia -499.05281749415 (53)

55.Hungary -513.21222918015 (54)

56. Sweden -518.97693608065 (55)

57.Norway -529.89345315788 (56)

58.Greece -530.85145334835 (57)