The American League Eastern Division

The American League Eastern Division is one of Major League Baseball's six divisions (An Eastern, Central, and Western division for each of the two leagues). This division was created before the start of the 1969 season along with the Western Division. Before that time the American League had existed as a single league of 10 teams.

Four of its five teams are located in the Eastern United States, with the other in Central Canada. At the end of the MLB season, the team with the best record in the division earns one of the American League's four playoff spots. The most recent team to win this division was the Tampa Bay Rays in 2010.

During its 41-year existence, an Eastern Division team has gone on to play in the World Series 25 times, and 14 of those teams have been crowned World Series Champions. Since the 1995 season when the wild-card playoff berth was introduced, the AL East has produced the wild-card team for the American League in 12 out of the 16 years (the Western Division three, and the Central Division just one).

American League

The American League of Professional Baseball Clubs, or simply the American League (AL), is one of two leagues that make up Major League Baseball in the United States and Canada. It developed from the Western League, a minor league based in the Great Lakes states, which eventually aspired to major league status. It is often called the Junior Circuit because it claimed Major League status for the 1901 season, 25 years after the formation of the National League (the "Senior Circuit").

At the end of every season, the American League champion plays in the World Series against the National League champion. Through 2010, American League teams have won 62 of the 106 World Series played since 1903, with 27 of those coming from the New York Yankees alone. The Texas Rangers are currently the defending American League champions. The New York Yankees have won 40 American League titles, the most in the league's history, followed by the Oakland Athletics (15) and the Boston Red Sox (12).

Short History of Baseball

Baseball has a long tradition in the United States. The most popular baseball league in the U.S. is Major League Baseball (MLB). Due to its 162-game schedule, it attracts more ticket sales than any other professional sports league in the world. Teams play almost every day from April to October. The World Series is the championship series of Major League Baseball, the culmination of the sport's postseason each October. It is played between the winner of each of the two leagues, the American League and the National League, and the winner is determined through a best-of-seven playoff.

Notable American baseball players in history include Babe Ruth, Joe DiMaggio, Lou Gehrig, Roberto Clemente, Hank Greenberg, Sandy Koufax, Willie Mays, Al Kaline, Stan Musial, Pete Rose, Hank Aaron, Nolan Ryan, Mike Schmidt, Honus Wagner, Ted Williams, Mickey Mantle, and Jackie Robinson, who was instrumental in dissolving the color line and allowing African-Americans into the major leagues. Today, some of the notable American players include Derek Jeter, Josh Hamilton, Ryan Braun, Chase Utley, Joe Mauer, Roy Halladay, Alex Rodriguez, Carl Crawford, Tim Lincecum.

Baseball and the variant, softball, are also popular participatory sports in the U.S. However, unlike American football, baseball is also popular in many other countries, notably Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, and Latin American countries such as the Dominican Republic, Cuba, Puerto Rico, Mexico, and Venezuela.

These countries are represented well in Major League Baseball today by players such as Hideki Matsui, Magglio Ordóñez, David Ortiz, Albert Pujols (born in the Dominican Republic, but developed in the U.S. and a naturalized American), Iván Rodríguez, Johan Santana, and Ichiro Suzuki. Canada, where baseball developed in tandem with the U.S., is also well represented in MLB with players such as past greats Ferguson Jenkins and Larry Walker and current stars Jason Bay, Russell Martin, Justin Morneau, and Joey Votto.

Introduction of Ice Hockey

Ice hockey is a team sport played on ice, in which skaters use their sticks to hit a puck into the opponent's net. A fast-paced physical sport, ice hockey is most popular in areas that are sufficiently cold for natural reliable seasonal ice cover, such as Canada, the Czech Republic, Latvia, Scandinavia, Finland, Russia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Germany, Austria, Switzerland, and the northern latitudes of the United States. With the advent of indoor artificial ice rinks it has become a year-round pastime in these areas. In North America, the National Hockey League (NHL) is the highest level for men and both the Canadian Women's Hockey League (CWHL) and the Western Women's Hockey League (WWHL) are the highest levels for women. It is the official national winter sport of Canada, where the game enjoys immense popularity.

While there are 68 total members of the International Ice Hockey Federation (IIHF), 162 of 177 medals at the IIHF World Championships have been taken by seven nations: Canada, the Czech Republic, Finland, Russia, Slovakia, Sweden and the United States. Of the 64 medals awarded in men's competition at the Olympic level from 1920 on, only six did not go to the one of those countries. All 12 Olympic and 36 IIHF World Women's Championships medals have gone to one of those seven countries, and every gold medal in both competitions has been won by either Canada or the United States.

Introduction of Basketball

Basketball is a team sport in which two teams of five players try to score points by throwing or "shooting" a ball through the top of a basketball hoop while following a set of rules. Basketball is one of the world's most popular and widely viewed sports.

A regulation basketball hoop consists of a rim 18 inches (45.7 cm) in diameter and 10 feet (3.05 m) high mounted to a backboard. A team can score a field goal by shooting the ball through the hoop during regular play. A field goal scores two points for the shooting team if a player is touching or closer to the hoop than the three-point line, and three points (a "3 pointer") if the player is "outside" the three-point line. The team with more points at the end of the game wins, but additional time (overtime) may be issued when the game ends with a tie. The ball can be advanced on the court by bouncing it while walking or running (dribbling) or passing it to a teammate. It is a violation (traveling) to walk with the ball, carry it, or to double dribble (to hold the ball and then resume dribbling).

Various violations are generally called "fouls". Disruptive physical contact (a personal foul) is penalized, and a free throw is usually awarded to an offensive player if he is fouled while shooting the ball. A technical foul may also be issued when certain infractions occur, most commonly for unsportsmanlike conduct on the part of a player or coach. A technical foul gives the opposing team a free throw.

Basketball has evolved many commonly used techniques of shooting, passing, and dribbling, as well as specialized player positions and offensive and defensive structures (player positioning) and techniques. Typically, the tallest members of a team will play "center", "small forward", or "power forward" positions, while shorter players or those who possess the best ball handling skills and speed play "point guard" or "shooting guard".

While competitive basketball is carefully regulated, numerous variations of basketball have developed for casual play. Competitive basketball is primarily an indoor sport played on carefully marked and maintained basketball courts, but less regulated variations are often played outdoors in both inner city and rural areas.

Video clip of Basketball

American Teams of Baseball

In North America, professional Major League Baseball (MLB) teams are divided into the National League (NL) and American League (AL). Each league has three divisions: East, West, and Central. Every year, the major league champion is determined by playoffs that culminate in the World Series. Four teams make the playoffs from each league: the three regular season division winners, plus one wild card team.

Introduction of Baseball

Baseball is a bat-and-ball sport played between two teams. Each team consists of nine players. The goal is to score runs by hitting a thrown ball with a bat and touching a series of four bases arranged at the corners of a ninety-foot square, or diamond. Players on one team (the batting team) take turns hitting against the pitcher of the other team (the fielding team), which tries to stop them from scoring runs by getting hitters out in any of several ways. A player on the batting team can stop at any of the bases and later advance via a teammate's hit or other means. The teams switch between batting and fielding whenever the fielding team records three outs. One turn at bat for each team constitutes an inning and nine innings make up a professional game. The team with the most runs at the end of the game wins.

Evolving from older bat-and-ball games, an early form of baseball was being played in England by the mid-eighteenth century. This game and the related rounders were brought by British and Irish immigrants to North America, where the modern version of baseball developed. By the late nineteenth century, baseball was widely recognized as the national sport of the United States. Baseball on the professional, amateur, and youth levels is now popular in North America, parts of Central and South America and the Caribbean, and parts of East Asia. The game is sometimes referred to as hardball, in contrast to the derivative game of softball.