Well, after an exciting round 1 featuring a Canadian upset of the U.S., a Dutch no-hitter(!) and Cuba getting mercy-ruled by the Puerto Ricans, round 2 is upon us.
Here’s the matchups:
Pool A (Angel Stadium, Anaheim)
South Korea
Mexico
Japan
United States
Pool B (Estadio Hiram Bithorn, San Juan)
Puerto Rico
Dominican Republic
Cuba
Venezuela
The top 2 from each pool move on to the semifinal round in San Diego at PETCO Park.
I’m picking Japan and the U.S. out of Pool A. South Korea has major-league pitching, but I don’t know that they have the hitting, and they didn’t look especially strong in their exhibitions against MLB teams. Mexico doesn’t have the pitching to go with that on-fire offense. I’d expect strong fan contingents for all four countries, though, with the large Korean community up the road in Los Angeles and the proximity to the Mexican border.
In Pool B, I’m giving the nod to the Dominican Republic and Puerto Rico. Venezuela has better pitching than Puerto Rico, but you can’t discount the home-field advantage PR will have. Cuba’s going to be overmatched, as their loss to Puerto Rico in Pool C showed. They struggled against a Panamanian team that went 0-3 and got no-hit by a single-A pitcher in the Netherlands game.
OK, sorry to bump my own thread like this, but after that Japan-U.S. game I imagine someone’s got something to say.
I’m not sure if the right call was made on the Japanese runner at 3rd in the 8th. From one angle, it looked like he left early, but from another it wasn’t, and I think the closer umpire should have made the call rather than whoever was supposed to make the call.
Lidge was worrying me with those 3 walks, but he managed to get the strikeout.
This was, even with the controversy about the runner, the best game so far. It was closer than the Dominican-Venezuela game, and one of the most exciting games I’ve seen that wasn’t a playoff game.
A little tough to get excited about a game (US-Japan) that is only be shown on ESPN Deportes (which isn’t carried by my cable system). I actually called a friend at the game and had him narrate the last three innings or so. Sure there was a lot of college basketball on TV this afternoon but I was rather annoyed that ESPN couldn’t find a few hours on one of their English language channels. My friend was of the opinion that the call against Japan in the 8th was a bad call, but apparently no replays were shown on the Jumbotron…
Yeah, it said “Tennis” on mine because they bumped coverage of a tennis tournament to show this game, since they thought this would be the Mexico-Korea game and not the U.S.-Japan game.
You missed a good one. I’m interested to see what kind of crowd Puerto Rico draws tonight, and what Mexico-Korea brings in.
ESPN Radio is going to cover the semis and final, and XM is carrying every game.
The MLB.TV deal for the WBC is well worth the $10, if for no other reason than getting to hear the between-inning chatter from the ESPN announcers. Apparently Steve Stone is a big “Boston Legal” fan and doesn’t know much about South African geography.
Yeah, Japan probably got jobbed on that call. I think this underscores the need for major league umps in 2009, and there should be an attempt to internationalize the umpiring corps for '09 so that it doesn’t look like an American ump is giving Team USA a little home cooking.
Korea beating Mexico is pretty surprising, at least to me, because I didn’t expect the Koreans to shut down the Mexican offense like that. Chan Ho Park being used as a closer is an interesting decision by In Sik Kim, but it seems to be working (and you know that San Diego has to be watching this and regretting ponying up for Trevor Hoffman.) I’m also amazed that more people showed up for this game than did for the Japan-U.S. game (almost 43,000 vs. 38,000.)
ESPN isn’t showing the U.S.-Korea game live tomorrow, which annoys me, but I’ll be watching online. The Dominican Republic-Cuba game at 2 will be the most critical, because the Dominican can’t afford another loss. Puerto Rico appears to be in the driver’s seat in Pool 2 right now.
Japan certainly got robbed on that call. As for 2009, my understanding is (which may be incorrect) that Japan will be hosting the tournament games. I hope the Japanese League umpires don’t “homer” the U.S. team as badly as it appears our umps homered the Japanese team.
I don’t really think there was a conspiracy against Japan, but that call sure stunk.
It was Bob “Bad Call” Davidson who made the call. A more arrogant, foolish xenophobe would be hard to find. That idiot needs to be out of the game permanently.
Considering they defected from Cuba to play in the US, I doubt they have any allegiances to their old country and even if they wanted to play for Cuba, they wouldn’t be allowed on the team.
The reversed appeal call was a stinker. The home plate umpire should do that only if the original ruling was unmistakeably incorrect. Still, you have to fault the Japanese runner for making it that close. If he had waited an additional half second, the call would have stood and they would have kept batting with a run in. Between that and the blowing on the hand being called (which I have NEVER seen happen before) I think the Japanese got stiffed majorly. One hopes that they win so they can earn a rematch.
Castro’s not in the habit of letting guys who left the island play for the Cuban national team, so El Duque and Livan Hernandez are in camp rather than in San Juan.
Anyone seen how the Japanese media is responding to this? I’m wondering if there’s a big outrage over the call.
I was at yesterday’s US-Japan game, and those of us in the stands rooting for USA were really nervous about that call. I was disappointed to get home and see that the call was indeed blown. Although I understand that Davidson should have been the one to make the call in the first place, I don’t see why he overruled the initial call unless he was absolutely certain. I think that it puts a shadow on the tournament, frankly. While it’s certainly possible that the US would have won the game anyway, I have to hope that Japan advances just so that this doesn’t become a bigger controversy down the line.
Imagine if Japan, Korea and the US all go 2-1 and Japan gets eliminated via tie-breaker. <shudder>
At any rate, despite the bad call and the assholes sitting in front of us who got kicked out of the stadium, but not until the 9th inning, that was a great game. It feels like baseball season to me now.
If the US can advance beyond this round, I’m going to do my best to make my way down to San Diego for the semi-finals.
Cuba has looked horrible against the Dominican Republic so far. They’ve run themselves out of 3 or 4 rallies, and David Ortiz hit a home run off the island.
Asimovian, good luck finding a ticket for San Diego. They sold out not long after they went on sale.