Australia shocked the international baseball world by winning the Silver Medal at the 2004 Summer Olympics, and the lingering memory of that stunning 1-0 semifinal victory over a Japan team that used its own professional players will make many people take special notice of this rising power from Down Under

The unveiling of the World Baseball Classic took place here Monday morning on the eve of Major League Baseball's annual All-Star Game, and Australia is one of 16 nations that will take part in the 18-day tournament to be played from March 3-20, 2006, in Japan, Puerto Rico and at two U.S. sites

The landmark field of countries invited to the World Baseball Classic also includes Canada, China, Chinese Taipei, Cuba, the Dominican Republic, Italy, the Netherlands, Japan, Korea, Mexico, Panama, Puerto Rico, South Africa, the U.S. and Venezuela

Australia is slotted for the tough Pool D, and will compete in the first round at a site to be named in Florida against stocked teams from the Dominican Republic and Venezuela, plus European power Italy, beginning on March 8

The tournament gives the Aussies a chance to again establish their growing baseball reputation on an international stage

Their lineup could have a Major League flavor to it, as more and more players from Australia stock the 40-man rosters of Major League teams
Trent Durrington of the Milwaukee Brewers and Justin Huber - who was recently up for two weeks with the Kansas City Royals - are prominent names eligible for the team

"I think it's going to be positive for baseball in Australia" Huber said
"The more publicity Australia can get, the more we can prove that baseball's a worthy sport in our country
If you ask the average Australian, they don't know what baseball is, they don't know that Australians play in the United States, they don't even know that such talented people actually go to the Major Leagues"

As the talent pool has grown larger, the Australians have begun to excel internationally
They not only qualified again for the Olympic baseball tournament in 2004 at Athens, Greece, but they finished fourth in pool play with a 4-3 record behind Japan, Cuba and Canada, with all four moving on to the medal round

The stunner, though, was soon to come - a 1-0 victory over Japan
It was a game that saw Chris Oxspring and Jeff Williams combine to pitch a five-hitter against a Japanese team that used its own Nippon Professional Leaguers in the Olympics for the first time in history

The Aussies then bowed to Cuba, 6-2, in the gold medal game to bring home Olympic Silver for the first time in their baseball history

But the World Baseball Classic, targeted to be held again in 2009 and then every four years after that, is the first international tournament to include Major League players on the 25-man rosters from each of the 30 Major League teams, thus giving Australia a chance again to bound like a kangaroo through the competition

The event will begin with the Asia Qualifying round on March 3 and end with the title game on March 20

The Aussies' Pool D will play its six-game schedule from March 8-11

The two teams with the best records go on to the second round in Puerto Rico against the top two teams from Pool C, which includes Cuba, Puerto Rico, Panama and the Netherlands

The single-elimination semifinals and finals are slated for the U.S. at venues still to be determined

There will be four pools of four teams each, with two teams emerging from each of the four Qualifying rounds to the second round
Two teams from each of the remaining pools move out of the second round and play each other in the semifinals

Each of the 16 teams in the tournament is guaranteed a minimum of three games, with the two finalists playing as many as eight

Each team will be allowed a roster of 27 players with a minimum of 12 pitchers

Major League players are expected to fill 270 of the 432 roster spots
A maximum of nine players from each of Major League Baseball's 30 teams will be eligible to play in the tournament
Any player signed to a Major League contract must be approved to participate in the event by Major League Baseball and the Major League Baseball Players Association

But any other player in the world is eligible to play for his nation if he is a citizen or if that nation is his country of origin
The baseball federations of each nation will select their teams in conjunction with Major League Baseball, the players association and any existing professional league in a particular nation