CAMBODIAN NATIONAL TEAM TO MEET VIETNAMESE SQUAD

In a truly remarkable story, Cambodia’s National Baseball Team will host a squad from neighboring Vietnam in a series March 10-14 in the Kompong Chhnang province town of Baribor. Cambodia’s first baseball field was carved from a rice paddy in this remote village in 2005, with dignitaries from Major League Baseball, Cambodia’s National Olympic Committee and the country’s U.S. Embassy were on hand, but the star of the show was Joe Cook.


Cook escaped Cambodia at age 12 in 1978 during the bloody reign of Pol Pot and landed in Tennessee, where he discovered baseball. He reunited with his sister in 2002 on a visit to Cambodia, and began collecting equipment to teach baseball to kids there. Cook has since become a central figure in Cambodian baseball despite residing in Alabama, and coached the National Team to an 0-5 record at the 2007 Southeast Asian Games in Thailand.

Cook says “Cambodia’s Cooperstown is Baribor,” but it’s unlikely a game at Doubleday Field has ever been interrupted by roaming water buffalo.