The problems are... (as you've already stated)
a) MLB is in mid-season
b) too little countries care about baseball...
... it will be scrapped from the Olympic schedule in 2012. This is the last time it is an Olympic event...
... I sincerely hope, it will be replaced by Rugby or Golf - truely...
^^ the main reason we don't see the best football players competing at the Olympics is, that FIFA is afraid to diminish the significance of the World Cup.
As long as the Olympics outshine World Championships (in any sport), we won't see the most talented soccer players at the Summer Games.
Side note concerning the pro /amateur thingy:
It never was fair because the Communist Countries always were allowed to send their best athletes (since they weren't considered pros - there was no professionalism in the Warsaw Pact countries to begin with!)
The only sports to allow hypocrisy...
Since the teams and athletes I support are outsiders to begin with, we are used to lose...
... always an exceptional experience to win a match...
Wimbledon '08!!!
Excuse the inappropriate comparison:
Iraq invaded Kuwait in August, 1990...
Southern Ossetia may be predominantly Russian on the ethnic level ... nonetheless, it's an integral part of Georgia.
Kosovo has opened the box of Pandora!
... which has been part of US foreign policy...
There is...