Type: Team games with a ball
Known as the national sport of the United States, baseball's origins in fact lie in the British Isles with the game of rounders which remains a popular childhood sport in Britain and Ireland. Baseball as it is know today was first played in the late 18th century and steadily progressed to becoming semi-professional about 50 years later and the first fully professional baseball team was founded in 1869 in Cincinnati. The main baseball competitions are known as the Major Leagues, of which there are two in North America, the National League and the American League, the champions of these leagues play against each other in the World Series each year, one of the world's most famous sporting competitions.