World Baseball Classic

Once again the World Baseball Classic has demonstrated that even the greatest players in the world can't beat an inspired team playing for National Pride.

I first saw a WBC game in 2006 when I went to see the US play Korea at Angels Stadium. I was expecting to see the US team easily defeat the Koreans. The US was largely Major Leaguers and the Korean team had only one I think, and he wasn't pitching that day. Instead, I saw a bunch of Superstars playing like it was spring training while an inspired national team picked them apart. The US team finished a disappointing 8th in that tournament. Korea lost only one game, to Japan, which left them in 3rd place.

I thought this year would be better. The US played an inspired game against Canada that looked and felt like a playoff game. And it included such greats as Derek Jeter, Kevin Youklis, and MLB MVP Dustin Pedroia. But by the second round injuries had thinned the group and the US finished the round 2-2 having only one their must win games. The comentators only added to my frustration when rather than call upon the US team to step up and tough it out they started calling for changes to the format, and making excuses. (Once again suggesting that our professional season is more important than a world competition.)

By contrast, Japan and Korea lost only to each other and in route to their final appearance Japan beat Cuba twice, and the US once. Korea soundly defeated Venezuela who had handed the US two of their previous three losses.

So it was an exciting game last night as Japan and Korea each came in 2-2 against each other and 4-0 against anyone else. Two teams that played old school baseball of singles, stolen bases, (both teams had strike-em out, throw-em out double plays), and sacrifice bunts and flies. Korea had their Ace on the mound who had beaten Japan twice, but Japan countered by taking long at-bats, and hit a lot of foul balls so that he had thrown almost his limit of 100 pitches after 4 inning. He left after 4+ having given up only 1 unearned run.

By the bottom of the 9th it was 3-2 Japan, but Korea fought back to send it to extra innings. Then in the 10th with runners on 2nd and 3rd, Korea made the mistake of pitching to Ichiro Suzuki, the best player in the game. It was only a single, but it drove in two runs and Korea wasn't able to respond in the bottom.

It was an exciting game to finish what is one of my favorite sporting events. And even though I only watched to incoming statistics and the team I was routing for (Korea, I think they were robbed in 2006) it was still fun.