Yes, he appears to be gloating...
Posted on 03/17/2006 11:58:14 PM PST by L.A.Justice
ANAHEIM - A shattered bat produced a never-a-doubt, double-play grounder, the "U-S-A!" chants gave way to the "Me-xi-co!" chants, and the longest off-season in baseball history began Thursday night. It's three years before the World Baseball Classic is scheduled to be held again, a thousand off-days before the United States gets another chance to prove what it failed miserably to demonstrate this time, which is that the country that developed the sport is still the best at playing it.
Beaten 2-1 by Mexico at Angel Stadium in front of 38,284 raucous fans of both sides, Team USA will not be going to San Diego for the event's Final Four.
Instead, it will be trying to figure out why it didn't do as well as Korea, Japan, Cuba and the Dominican Republic.
"There's no doubt this team shouldn't be out in the second round," pitcher Jake Peavy said quietly outside the clubhouse when it was, suddenly, over.
Clearly, the United States needs to do something different in 2009, when WBC promoters plan the second edition of what would thereafter be an every-four-years event.
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If players weren't giving it the anybody-can-beat-anybody routine, some were using the tournament's timing as an excuse.
"You're not going to find one guy in (the U.S. clubhouse) who felt like he was in midseason form," Michael Young said.
But since playing the WBC right after the World Series would present its own problems, there's only one other way for U.S. major-leaguers to be
ready to give their best in March. We'll see in '09 whether they're willing to show up for some sort of pre-spring-training Team USA camp.
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Maybe the pressure of expectations and the rust of March were a strangling combination. Maybe Team USA needs more pre-WBC work next time. Maybe more major-league stars will be persuaded to join up next time.
Or maybe this wasn't such a freakish result.
"For so long, we were the teachers of baseball around the world," U.S. manager Buck Martinez had been saying on the field before Thursday's game. "Now we can learn something from the Koreas and Japans because of their work ethic and practice regimes. They don't make mistakes."
The U.S. players cared. They played hard. They didn't embarrass themselves, or us.
They just weren't good enough for 10 days in March in a world in which most of the best baseball games are not American.
Cuba plays Dominican Republic Saturday afternoon. College basketball games are on at that time...Oh, by the way, if you live on the West Coast, you could watch women's college basketball games Saturday night...
The A-rod curse continues....
The other teams seem to be very competitive, ready to play, ready to win and they were in good physical shape. The announcing in one of the games was outstanding, with Orel Hershiser doing the color.
MLB has been a huge turnoff for us due to the poor game calling; unnecessary talking about everything except baseball; the prima donna "I'm a Star" attitudes of certain players, and the spector of performance enhancing drugs.
This has been a refreshing hint of what baseball was like before expansion.
We would like to see it as an annual event, evolving into a true world series.
Is it me or is the author gloating?
I was heartened to see so many assimilated, legal, patriotic Americans of Mexican descent there cheering on the American team.
If you're watching the Olympics, if you're watching college football, if you're watching hockey, basketball, or what have you, you're watching performance enhancing drugs. Period. If you watch a high school football game, you are, as well. If you're watching the Japanese play, yep, you're watching performance enhancing drugs. The game is too competitive to not use some.
Some of them are going to be legal, and some aren't. Some will have just been used in the pre-season. But they were used.
Creatine is a performance enhancing drug, though your body makes it naturally (and it's legal). Is the qualification that it shouldn't be legal if it's not natural? How about testosterone?
The whole argument about performance enhancing drugs seems ridiculous to me. Food is a type of drug. Eat enough of the right types, and you get an effect. Am I abusing tuna if I eat way more than the average person in a day? If you want to talk legal or illegal drugs, that's a slightly different story (though I'd argue that many things that are banned are done so foolishly--witness courts reinstating the use of ephedra after it was determined the Feds had not given any conclusive evidence that it was dangerous when properly used).
BTW, the primadona attitude turns me off, too. That's why I love college sports so much more than professional sports. There's more team play, more heart, more soul. Sorry, I think I agree with you for the most part. It's just the ridiculousness of the media in covering these performance enhancing drugs is beyond ridiculous.
Remember when the media started talking about how Mark McGwire used Andro (when that's what he said he used)? Do you know what Andro is? (i.e. Androstenedione) It's produced by your adrenal gland and has almost no effect in men. About the only thing your body is going to do with it is convert it into estrogen. It's a stimulator of the female libido, but it really doesn't have a role in men.
And so the media bit this hook, line, and sinker and acted 1) as if this was a terrible thing and 2) as if this was actually what helped McGwire achieve his amazing season. It just shows how incompetent these media types are and how unwilling they are to research out a story or even go to those who will know the slightest about what they're talking about.
End rant. I know what you're saying. I really do.
Yes, he appears to be gloating...
Very good post Banjoguy, especially the "prima donna I'm a star', attitude of Americans. It isn't just baseball, look at the basketball players at the olympics etc.
Like it is an inconvenience taking away from their spoiled lives to play the damn game.
You see the glee in the Mexicans eyes after they won?
U.S. players, oh well.
The risible and hapless Bud Selig must be soiling himself right about now. Good. This was his baby. He deserves it. There's been no weaker commissioner in the history of the game.
For letting the cheaters cheat the last 10 years and ruin the game, I'm glad the clown from Milwaukee is getting what's coming to him.
US players want to get back to their real jobs of getting ready for the baseball season. They have multi-million dollar contracts to fulfill. No one is going to bust their butts for something that resembles Olympic baseball. And with March Madness in full swing, no one will miss these meaningless baseball games.
LOL!
"MLB has been a huge turnoff for us due to...and the spector of performance enhancing drugs."
From ESPN:
NEW YORK -- Korea pitcher Myung Hwan Park has tested positive for a banned substance and is disqualified from the World Baseball Classic, Major League Baseball said in a release Friday.
Park tossed two shutout innings in one appearance with Korea, striking out three and walking two.
Korea is undefeated heading into its matchup with Japan in the WBC semifinals Saturday night at San Diego's Petco Park.
I'm thinking toss Korea out and let USA in.Apparently we've passed our drug tests for this event.
Japanese teams were practicing in December.
Yes, the US has never won the World Baseball Classic when A-rod has been on the team.
The obvious explanation for this year's loss is the old standby: "it's Bush's fault!" It will be different in 2009. The US team will be fired up to win one for Hillary.
Neville I agree with everything you've said but you are far to kind in Seligs regards.
To him it is all about money, same as for many of todays players.
Hell, after games Willie Mays used to go play stick ball with the neighborhood kids.
Many of todays stars won't even sign autographs for the kids. Some do but you'd be amazed at what the attitude of many are here in Florida at sprng training games.
Here! Here! How arrogant of our MLB to call their championship the "World" Series.
If baseball started to move in this direction I might become interested in the game again.
And I would drop it like a hot rock.
First olympic basketball and now this! What's next?
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