The Ra'anana Express () was an Israeli

baseball Baseball is a bat-and-ball games, bat-and-ball sport played between two team sport, teams of nine players each, taking turns batting (baseball), batting and Fielding (baseball), fielding. The game occurs over the course of several Pitch ...

team from

Ra'anana Ra'anana () is an affluent city in the southern Sharon, Israel, Sharon Plain of the Central District (Israel), Central District of Israel. It was founded in 1922 as an American-Jewish settlement, 1 km south of the village of Tabsur, where a ...

in the now-defunct

Israel Baseball League The Israel Baseball League (IBL; Hebrew: ליגת הבייסבול הישראלית, ''Ligat ha-Beisbol ha-Israelit'') was a five-team professional baseball league in Israel. The first game was played on June 24, 2007. The league was discontinue ...

. The Express finished the inaugural 2007 season in fifth place, 17-24 (.415), and lost to the

Netanya Tigers The Netanya Tigers () was an Israeli baseball team from Netanya in the Israel Baseball League. The Tigers finished the inaugural 2007 season in fourth place, 19-21 (.475), and were defeated by the Bet Shemesh Blue Sox in the semifinals of the ...

in the semifinals of the 2007 championship.

History

In 2007 the team was managed by Australian Shaun Smith. The first player selected by the Express in the inaugural 2007 draft was

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country comprising mainland Australia, the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania and list of islands of Australia, numerous smaller isl ...

n pitcher John Thew. The team's first game was played against the Tel Aviv Lightning on June 24, 2007, at the Sportek in

Tel Aviv Tel Aviv-Yafo ( or , ; ), sometimes rendered as Tel Aviv-Jaffa, and usually referred to as just Tel Aviv, is the most populous city in the Gush Dan metropolitan area of Israel. Located on the Israeli Mediterranean coastline and with a popula ...

. Starting pitcher Esequier Pie, from

San Pedro de Macorís San Pedro de Macorís is a city and municipality (''municipio'') in the Dominican Republic. The capital of its eponymous province in the east region of the country, it is among the ten largest cities of the Dominican Republic. The city has approx ...

in the

Dominican Republic The Dominican Republic is a country located on the island of Hispaniola in the Greater Antilles of the Caribbean Sea in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean. It shares a Maritime boundary, maritime border with Puerto Rico to the east and ...

, threw two

no-hitter In baseball, a no-hitter or no-hit game is a game in which a team does not record a hit (baseball), hit through conventional methods. Major League Baseball (MLB) officially defines a no-hitter as a completed game in which a team that batted in ...

s in the 2007 season.

Stadium

Located in the Baptist Village in

Petah Tikva Petah Tikva (, ), also spelt Petah Tiqwa and known informally as Em HaMoshavot (), is a city in the Central District (Israel), Central District of Israel, east of Tel Aviv. It was founded in 1878, mainly by Haredi Judaism, Haredi Jews of the Old Y ...

, the

Yarkon Sports Complex The Yarkon Sports Complex, is located in the Baptist Village in Petah Tikva, just outside Tel Aviv. The field was used in the 2007 season of the Israel Baseball League The Israel Baseball League (IBL; Hebrew: ליגת הבייסבול הישר� ...

is home to the Express as well as the

Petach Tikva Pioneers The petah Tikva Pioneers () was an Israeli baseball team from Petah Tikva in the Israel Baseball League. They finished the inaugural 2007 regular season in last place (9-32; .220), and lost to the Modi'in Miracle in the quarterfinals of the 200 ...

and the Israeli national baseball team.

2007 roster

External links

Official site of the Ra'anana ExpressSouth Florida Ra'anana Express Fan Club

Footnotes

Baseball teams in Israel {{Asia-baseball-team-stub