(Story by Marco Stoovelaar)
 Japan downs USA; Taiwan beats Cuba; 5 teams reach Quarter-Finals
Nederlands
    TAOYUAN / TAICHUNG / TAIPEI / DOULIU (Taiwan) -
Japan and Canada remained unbeaten in the preliminary round of the Premier12, winning their games on Saturday (November 14), Day 7 of the event.
Today, five teams secured themselves of a spot in the Quarter Finals, which will be played next Monday.
The winners of those games will then travel to Tokyo (Japan), where the Semi-Finals will be played next Thursday and Friday.
The Bronze Medal-game and Final will be played on Saturday, November 21 in the Tokyo Dome.
In the afternoon today, the team of the Kingdom of the Netherlands won 11-7 vs. Puerto Rico to become the first team to officially reach the Quarter Finals.
Recap of this game
Later today, South Korea, Japan and Canada also reached the Quarter Finals.
The USA, which lost big to Japan, also advanced to the top-8 after the loss by Mexico.
A 3-way tie is possible in Pool B, but the USA then will advance based on the Team Quality Balance tie-breaker.
Before all games today, there was a moment of silence to honor the victims of the terrible tragedy in Paris (France) on Friday-evening.
(November 14)
Venezuela vs. Dominican Republic
The day started with the game between Venezuela and the Dominican Republic in Taoyuan.
Venezuela won 8-6 and with that, the Dominicans remained winless and were elimimated for the Quarter Finals.
Two years ago, the Dominican Republic won the third edition of the World Baseball Classic and with that is the reigning world champion, as the WBC also has the status of World Championship.
Venezuela now has to hope that Mexico will be defeated by the Dominicans on Sunday.
In that case, Venezuela also will reach the top-8.
Another scenario for Venezuela to qualify is win against unbeaten Japan on Sunday.
The Dominicans trailed 1-0 after the first inning, but then they scored three runs on five hits in the top of the second inning.
The tying run was scored on a double play-grounder, then a single by Robinzon Diaz and a throwing error brought in the next two runs.
Venezuela got one run back in the third when Gregorio Petit homered, but the Dominicans took more distance, scoring twice in the fourth to take a 5-2 lead.
With runners on second and third base, a runscoring single by Ronny Rodriguez followed.
Later in the at bat, another throwing error led to the fifth Dominican run.
But hereafter, the game turned Venezuela's way.
A single by Rainer Olmedo narrowed the Venezuelan deficit to 5-3 in the fifth inning, then the team came alongside in the sixth at bat.
With two outs and the bases loaded, Renny Osuna delivered a 2-run single to make it a 5-5 score.
In the seventh, Venezuela took an 8-5 lead.
Rainer Olmedo led off with a single, then Gregorio Petit was hit by a pitch.
After the two advanced on a sacrifice bunt, Juan Luis Rivera was walked intentionally.
After a pitching change, Luis Jimenez delivered a 3-run double, clearing the bases.
The Dominicans scored only one more run in the eighth.
Mexico vs. South Korea
In the evening, at Taipei, South Korea won 4-3 vs. Mexico.
With the win, South Korea reached the Quarter Finals.
When Mexico wins on Sunday vs. the Dominican Republic and Venezuela is defeated by Japan, Mexico also will qualify, while Venezuela then is eliminated.
Because of Mexico's loss, the USA qualified for the top-8.
The Asian squad held a 4-0 lead in the third inning, was then held scoreless, but hold onto the lead.
Mexico started to come back from the bottom of the third inning, but ended up just short.
South Korea opened with two runs in the first inning.
Keun-woo Jeong and Yong-kyu Lee both walked, then both scored on a double by Hyun-soo Kim.
A run was added in the second inning.
With two outs, Jae-ho Kim and Keun-woo Jeong hit back-to-back doubles that made it 3-0.
The lead was increased to 4-0 in the third inning when Byung-ho Park homered with two outs.
In the bottom of the third inning, Mexico got two runs back.
José Torres walked and scored on an one-out triple by Juan Perez.
The latter then scored on sacrifice fly by Kevin Medrano.
In the fifth, Mexico made it a 4-3 score thanks to a wild pitch, but was unable to turn the game its way and was left empty-handed.
...The umpire crew for this game...
...Atsushi Kittaka (1B, Japan), Edgar Estivison (HP, Panama),...
...Chung-Hung Wang (3B, Taiwan), Winfried Berkvens (2B, Netherlands)... |
USA vs. Japan
At Taoyuan, Japan remained unbeaten by winning 10-2 vs. USA to qualify for the Quarter Finals.
Despite the loss, the USA also will advance to the top-8, thanks to the loss by Mexico and based on possible combinations in the standings after Sunday's games.
Initially, the USA led 2-0 after three innings.
In the second, Matt McBride homered and in the third, the second run was scored on a single by Bret Eibner.
Japan got one run back in the fourth on a double by Yoshitomo Tsutsugo, then rallied for four runs on four hits in the sixth after an American pitching change.
With one out, Tetsuto Yamada walked and Takeya Nakamura singled.
After another pitching change, Yoshitomo Tsutsugo singled to bring in the tying run, then Sho Nakata followed with a 3-run homerun that gave Japan a 5-2 lead.
In the seventh, Japan added five more runs.
Shogo Akiyama led off with a walk, followed by a pitching change.
He moved on a sac-bunt, then Tetsuto Yamada walked.
With two outs, Yoshitomo Tsutsugo singled in a run, but then the bases got loaded when Sho Nakata walked.
Hereafter, Nobuhiro Matsuda accounted for the big hit of the game, hitting a grand slam homerun to lift the score to 10-2!
In this game, Dutch umpire Winfried Berkvens was at second base.
Canada vs. Italy
At Douliu City, Canada shutout Italy 4-0.
With that, Canada also officially reached the Quarter Finals, while Italy was eliminated.
Italy, with lost 7-1 in its first two games, then was crushed 16-1 by the Netherlands Kingdom Team, today played a good game.
Two pitchers gave up only five hits.
Starter Luis Lugo struckout seven batters in the five innings he pitched.
Canada opened the score with two runs in the first inning.
With one out, Pete Orr walked, then Tyler O'Neill homered.
Two runs were added in the fourth inning, thanks to a sacrifice fly by Skyler Stromsmoe and a bunt-single by Sean Jamieson.
Italy reached third base only twice in this game.
The first time was in the seventh inning when Alessandro Vaglio led off with a double and advanced on a grounder.
The second time was in the eighth at bat.
Nicholas Morreale then led off with a walk, moved on a grounder and a wild pitch, but also stranded on third base.
Dutch scorer Linda Steijger was one of the three Official Scorers at this game.
Chinese Taipei vs. Cuba
At Taichung, Chinese Taipei broke an 1-1 tie with a 3-run homerun in the eighth inning to win 4-1 vs. Cuba, which was an important win for the hosting country.
Both teams can advance to the Quarter Finals on Sunday.
Taiwan then meets Puerto Rico in a crucial afternoon game.
When Taiwan wins, both they and Cuba advance.
Cuba has the biggest chance to advance on its own, facing winless Italy.
When Puerto Rico and Cuba both win, they will advance and Taiwan will be eliminated.
When Puerto Rico wins and Cuba loses, that will then result in a 3-way tie with Taiwan.
The score of the game between Puerto Rico and Taiwan then will be decisive to determine the ranking of these three teams, two of whom will continue to the next round.
In the second inning, Taipei opened the score.
With runners on first and second base and two outs, Dai-Kang Yang delivered a runscoring single.
Cuba was unsuccessful at the bases in the first innings.
In the second, Alfredo Despaigne was eliminated at third base trying to advance on a grounder to short by Alexander Malleta, who later was caught stealing.
In the third, Lourdes Gurriel was caught stealing.
Taiwan left two runners on base in the fourth, then turned a double play in the fifth, but saw Cuba come alongside in the sixth.
With two outs, Yulieski Gurriel tripled and scored on an error to make it 1-1.
Taiwan then left the bases loaded in the sixth inning and stranded two runners in the seventh.
But in the eighth inning, the more than 17,000 noisy spectators had something to cheer.
Po-Hung Wang led off with a walk, which led to a pitching change.
Wang then moved on a sac-bunt and Yen-Wen Kuo was walked intentionally to set up a force play.
Hereafter, Chih-Sheng Lin drilled the ball into deep leftfield for a 3-run homerun and a 4-1 lead for the Taiwanese squad.
|
