The World Games I baseball competition was held on July 27–30, 1981, at San Jose Municipal Stadium in San Jose, California. The 1981 Games were the first World Games, an international quadrennial multi-sport event, and were held in California's Santa Clara Valley. Teams from the United States, Australia, South Korea and Panama participated.

Spike Dee Owen is an American former shortstop in Major League Baseball who played for the Seattle Mariners (1983–86), Boston Red Sox (1986–88), Montreal Expos (1989–92), New York Yankees (1993) and California Angels (1994–95). He made his major league debut on June 25, 1983. In his 13 seasons in the majors, he hit for a .246 batting average with 46 home runs and 439 RBIs in 1544 games.