Baseball, widely known as America's pastime, is well-established in several other countries as well.
The Japanese major leagues—the Central League and Pacific League—have long been considered the highest quality professional circuits outside of the United States.
Japan has a professional minor league system as well, though it is much smaller than the American version—each team has only one farm club in contrast to MLB teams' four or five.
After World War II, professional leagues were founded in many Latin American nations, most prominently Venezuela (1946) and the Dominican Republic (1955).
Since the early 1970s, the annual Caribbean Series has matched the championship clubs from the four leading Latin American winter leagues:
①the Dominican Winter League
②Mexican Pacific League
③Puerto Rican Professional Baseball League
④Venezuelan Professional Baseball League
In Asia, South Korea (1982), Taiwan (1990), and China (2003) all have professional leagues.