World Baseball Classic

[Cironnu]

The Royals are sending Reuben Gotay to the Puerto Rican team, Justin Huber to the Australian, Elmer Dessens to the Mexico team, Matt Stairs and Aaron Guiel to the Canadian team, and minor leaguer Barry Armitage to the South African team. Something tells me that Gotay has the best shot of seeing the finals, that's for sure.

The Orioles are less than thrilled though. Last I heard they were sending something like fourteen players, including 4/5 of their rotation. Ouch!

I'm really looking forward to this, even though there are countries involved that I'd have never guessed played baseball! South Africa? The friggin' NETHERLANDS?? Still, why not? The more the merrier, IMO.

[lautrec]

Don't forget, the Netherlands has Andruw Jones. He could beat the Royals singlehandedly.

[Cironnu]

Nah, just do the Barry, and walk him every time he's up, even if the bases are loaded.

Matt Stairs had a couple of RBI's for Canada yesterday, and Aaron Guiel chipped in with a double and a walk. Unfortunately, some of that damage (from Stairs) was against Royals prospect Barry Armitage, who got a little roughed up for the South African team. Elmer Dessens pitched two scoreless innings for Mexico against a very strong USA lineup. Huber didn't have a good day though, going 0-3 with two K's for Australia. Overall, I'm pretty happy with the way things are going for the Royals participating in the WBC. I can't wait to see how our guys do today. I know that a lot of people don't like the Classic, but I'm paying a lot more attention to it than I am Royals spring training games, that's for sure. Early spring training games suck under the best of circumstances. 2-3 weeks from now, it'll be a different story, but for now..........

[Cironnu]

Well, today Matt Stairs went 1-4 with a 2 RBI double and a walk, and Aaron Guiel went 1-3 with a triple, a walk, and a run scored, both for the Canadian team, who stunned the US with a 8-6 victory. Reuben Gotay went 0-1 in a pinch hit appearance for Puerto Rico.

The Canadian Royals are contributing pretty well so far!

[lautrec]

It's probably just me, being a Royals fan and all, but I could really see a US collapse coming. I think the biggest problem, is I friggin ordered a Clemens USA jersey last night, after the Mexico win.

I don't know what I was thinking, it probably jinxed them. Also, and I hate to admit this, but I finally turned off the XM braodcast when Canada took a 7-0 lead, and when I turned it back on, it was 8-6, and I shouldn't have, but I listened the rest of the way, and they didn't score again. They probably would have won, had I not turned the game back on, or shut it off immediately when I saw the score.

My bad, fellas.

[Cironnu]

:grouchy Isn't that how it goes? I can't tell you how many times I've had that happen between me and the Royals. The less attention I pay, the better they seem to do. Grr.......

[lautrec]

Cirronnu - I don't know how you are, but during the 1985 series, my uncle and I found out in game 5, if we stood up the whole game and watched, the Royals would win. We stood up for games 5,6 and 7..... and my uncle is a fairly respected dentist...but, unfortunately, a baseball fan.

Yes, it always seems to be that if you don't watch, they do better. weird.

[Cironnu]

In that case, I just hope your legs didn't get too worn out. And that you kept on standing anyway!

[PLowry]

Certain plays go down into baseball history as extremely decisive and extremely dramatic legends. Especially when said plays determine the outcome of an entire season, either in a pennant race, the playoffs, the World Series, or the World Baseball Classic (WBC).

Such plays would be:

Fred Merkle's Boner, failure to touch second base, in 1908 that cost the Giants the NL pennant to the Cubs,

Bobby Thompson's 3-r8n homer, the "Shot Heard Around the World", to win the NL pennant tie-breaker over the Dodgers in 1951.

Billy Mazeroski's home run in the bottom of the 9th inning to win the 1960 World Series 7th game over the Yankees

Dave Henderson's 2-run homer with two strikes and two outs in the ninth inning, with his Red Sox behind the Angels 3 games to one in the 1986 ALCS, which enabled the Red Sox to eventually come back to win the series 4 games to three.

Billy Buckner's fielding miscue which cost the Red Sox the World Series to the Mets in 1986.

A Panamanian batter's decision to twist out of the way of a Cuban pitcher's pitch that would have been a Hit By Pitch in the 2006 WBC. Had the batter hung in there and "taken one for the team", the game would have been over right then and there in 9 innings with a Panama victory 7-6, since the bases were then loaded. Instead, Cuba went on to an 8-6 victory in 11 innings. Had Panama won, Cuba would never have gone on to the Second Round, nor to the Semi-Finals, nor to the Final Game, which it lost to Japan 10-6.

Ichiro Suzuki's two-run single in the top of the 10th inning against South Korea that won the 2009 WBC Title Game 5-3.

My question is why Brian Hosmer's bonehead baserunning mistake in the bottom of the 9th inning of Game 7 of the 2014 World Series has not been added to this Pantheon of decisive and dramatic legends.

The Giants led the Royals by one run going into the bottom of the 9th inning at Kauffman Stadium. With two outs, the Royals were down to their last out, with Hosmer coming to the plate.

He then hit a long drive off the left center field wall. A double for sure. Then the Giants outfield bobbled the ball. Now Hosmer had three bases for sure. And finally, the Giants outfield literally kicks the ball about 25 feet away. Its second error on the same play. Now Hosmer will have four bases for sure. The Third Base Coach is frantically waving him home to score the tying run. But Hosmer has gone into Cruise Control midway between second base and third base. He never speeds up again, as the ball is literally kicked about 25 feet by the Giants outfield. To me, this is as boneheaded as Fred Merkle's failure to touch second base back in 1908.