The Pony League World Series is the flagship tournament of PONY Baseball and Softball. After the creation of the organization in 1951, there were already 505 teams across 106 leagues the following year. This prompted PONY to create the Pony League World Series in
Washington County, Pennsylvania, which has hosted a majority of the tournaments since the inaugural edition in 1952. From 1964 through 1983, the tournament did not have a set location and sometimes took place in other states: California (1964–1965, 1978), Iowa (1979–1980), Illinois (1967, 1974–1975), Nebraska (1966), Texas (1977), and Washington (1983). The first participant from Puerto Rico was a team from
Cataño in 1971. The tournament is currently sponsored by
Dick's Sporting Goods and the games are streamed on
MLB.com, the official site of
Major League Baseball. The recent finals can also be found on
YouTube. After the 2020 edition was canceled due to the
COVID-19 pandemic, the 2021 edition was staged with only US-based teams (including a team from Puerto Rico).
Champions Source: Note: In cases of conflicting records, contemporary news reports have been given priority.
Controversy In the 2023 Pony Asia-Pacific Zone Championships held in
Fukushima, Japan, a controversial decision was made, where the Japanese officials unilaterally revoked Taiwan (Chinese Taipei)'s Pony League World Series qualification after losing to Taiwan in the championship game. The reason for disqualification was the alleged use of unapproved bats by the Taiwanese team. However, the PONY league pre-approved the bats prior to each game with stickers. There have also never been complaints from other teams prior to the championship game. In the end, despite Taiwan gathering supports from the majority of the teams, including
Hong Kong (1 team) and
Mainland China (3 teams) who protested against the decision to disqualify Taiwan, the complaint was overruled by
Japan,
Philippines and
Australia, where the two decision-making officials were from
Japan and
Philippines. The incident attracted widespread media attention in Taiwan due to the perceived lack of transparency and fairness. The
Taoyuan City Government and Taiwan's
Sports Administration immediately filed an official complaint to the PONY Baseball and Softball organization headquarters, and are waiting for a reply.
Championship totals (
Taiwan) By
U.S. state or non-U.S. country. Updated through the 2025 championship (71 playings, 142 total appearances). ==Gallery==