Two spots in the Baseball at the 2004 Summer Olympics were available to baseball teams of the Pan American Baseball Confederation. To decide which teams would qualify, a tournament was held in 2003 in Panama, from October 30 to November 10. The tournament was won by Cuba, with Canada also qualifying for the Olympics. Notably, the United States team did not qualify, after losing to Mexico in quarterfinals. This elicited shock in the American mediaUSA Today
/ref> as the USA was the previous gold medal winner, and was the first country to play baseball and is the country where baseball has the largest following.

Withdrawals

Although the tournament was originally scheduled to include 13 teams, four withdrew before their first game: Venezuela, the Dominican Republic,

Aruba Aruba ( , , ), officially the Country of Aruba ( nl, Land Aruba; pap, Pais Aruba) is a constituent country of the Kingdom of the Netherlands physically located in the mid-south of the Caribbean Sea, about north of the Venezuela peninsula of ...

and the Bahamas. As the Bahamas were a last-minute withdrawal, the tournament structure was left unbalanced, with one pool larger than the other.

Pool Play

Pool A

Pool B

The game between the and was delayed due to weather. Before it could be played it became irrelevant to the standings, and was therefore cancelled.

Elimination

{{8TeamBracket , RD1-seed1=A1 , RD1-team1={{bb, CUB , RD1-score1=5 , RD1-seed2=B4 , RD1-team2={{bb, BRA , RD1-score2=0 , RD1-seed3=B2 , RD1-team3={{bb, PAN , RD1-score3=3 , RD1-seed4=A3 , RD1-team4={{bb, PUR , RD1-score4=5 , RD1-seed5=B1 , RD1-team5={{bb, USA , RD1-score5=1 , RD1-seed6=A4 , RD1-team6={{bb, MEX , RD1-score6=2 , RD1-seed7=A2 , RD1-team7={{bb, CAN , RD1-score7=14 , RD1-seed8=B3 , RD1-team8={{bb, COL , RD1-score8=6 , RD2-seed1=A1 , RD2-team1={{bb, CUB , RD2-score1=10 , RD2-seed2=A3 , RD2-team2={{bb, PUR , RD2-score2=0 , RD2-seed3=A4 , RD2-team3={{bb, MEX , RD2-score3=1 , RD2-seed4=A2 , RD2-team4={{bb, CAN , RD2-score4=11 , RD3-seed1=A1 , RD3-team1={{bb, CUB , RD3-score1=5 , RD3-seed2=A2 , RD3-team2={{bb, CAN , RD3-score2=0

References

Baseball America
2003 in baseball 2003 in Panamanian sport October 2003 sports events in North America November 2003 sports events in North America International baseball competitions hosted by Panama Baseball at the 2004 Summer Olympics Americas Baseball