2023 World Baseball Classic Thread

[mmc]

USA: Mike Trout

Mexico: Patrick Sandoval, Gerardo Reyes

Venezuela: Luis Rengifo, Jhonathan Diaz, Jose Quijada

Dominican Republic: Carlos Estevez, Cesar Valdez

Japan: Shohei Ohtani

Italy: David Fletcher, Glenn Albanese

Panama: Jaime Barria

Israel: Zach Weiss, Jake Kalish

UK: D'Shawn Knowles

China: Alan Carter

Australia: Aaron Whitefield

Columbia: Gio Urshela, Gustavo Campero

[Second Base]

Oof, feel bad for Israel in that bracket. But at least they'll be able to showcase Zach Borenstein again. I hear he's the next Daniel Nava. 

[Second Base]

And two more things to look forward to.

#1 - The best players from USA opting out. Last USA team was led by the immortal Eric Hosmer and Adam Jones. 

#2 - The odds of the tournament being postponed orr cancelled due to an outbreak of some sort. Right now I put it at 20%. 

[cals]

48 minutes ago, Second Base said:

Oof, feel bad for Israel in that bracket. But at least they'll be able to showcase Zach Borenstein again. I hear he's the next Daniel Nava. 

Let’s be honest, any bracket was gonna be a challenge for them.

[m0nkey]

3 hours ago, Second Base said:

And two more things to look forward to.

#1 - The best players from USA opting out. Last USA team was led by the immortal Eric Hosmer and Adam Jones. 

#2 - The odds of the tournament being postponed orr cancelled due to an outbreak of some sort. Right now I put it at 20%. 

Wasn't a complete list of bums either.  They also had McCutchen, Stanton, and Yelich in the OF, and Goldschmidt and Arenado on the infield

[T.G.]

3 hours ago, m0nkey said:

Wasn't a complete list of bums either.  They also had McCutchen, Stanton, and Yelich in the OF, and Goldschmidt and Arenado on the infield

That doesn't fit his narrative.

[Ender]

I wish USA would go all out.

Trout, Judge, Betts.

Arenado, tim Anderson, trea turner, Goldschmidt, realmuto.

Degrom, scherzer,Verlander, burnes .... Hader.

I can't think of others off the top of my head, but damn.

 

[Taylor]

12 hours ago, True Grich said:

That doesn't fit his narrative.

Are you saying that cals doesn't stand with Israel?

[cals]

22 minutes ago, Taylor said:

Are you saying that cals doesn't stand with Israel?

Your reading comprehension is terrible.  Which is surprising, considering all you’ve taught us about the world that you’ve read in books.

[Taylor]

9 minutes ago, cals said:

Your reading comprehension is terrible.  Which is surprising, considering all you’ve taught us about the world that you’ve read in books.

I was making a joke. Perhaps your brain is caught between cals and the Christian nationalist personality, so you took offense to a measly joke about your opinion on the State of Israel.

[Second Base]

16 hours ago, m0nkey said:

Wasn't a complete list of bums either.  They also had McCutchen, Stanton, and Yelich in the OF, and Goldschmidt and Arenado on the infield

Cutch, Stanton and Yelich are a far cry from Trout, Harper and Judge. Goldy is legit though.

[cals]

10 minutes ago, Taylor said:

I was making a joke. Perhaps your brain is caught between cals and the Christian nationalist personality, so you took offense to a measly joke about your opinion on the State of Israel.

It makes sense that when you make a joke it isn’t funny.  Like a woman.

[m0nkey]

11 minutes ago, Taylor said:

I was making a joke. Perhaps your brain is caught between cals and the Christian nationalist personality, so you took offense to a measly joke about your opinion on the State of Israel.

He was quoting my post, not cals’

[Blarg]

4 hours ago, Ender said:

I wish USA would go all out.

Trout, Judge, Betts.

Arenado, tim Anderson, trea turner, Goldschmidt, realmuto.

Degrom, scherzer,Verlander, burnes .... Hader.

I can't think of others off the top of my head, but damn.

 

Unless they play all of the games in Seattle, Trout can sit this one out for the good of the team.

[Taylor]

19 minutes ago, m0nkey said:

He was quoting my post, not cals’

I'm and idoit.

Sorry cals, and to anyone else I offended with my idiotic actions.

[Blarg]

3 minutes ago, Taylor said:

I'm and idoit.

Sorry cals, and to anyone else I offended with my idiotic actions.

[T.G.]

2 hours ago, Second Base said:

Cutch, Stanton and Yelich are a far cry from Trout, Harper and Judge. Goldy is legit though.

Compared to Hosmer and Adam Jones at the time, the three represented well. “We” know what you tried to do… and @m0nkey called you on it.

”We” doesn’t include @Taylor, obviously.

[Second Base]

15 minutes ago, True Grich said:

Compared to Hosmer and Adam Jones at the time, the three represented well. “We” know what you tried to do… and @m0nkey called you on it.

”We” doesn’t include @Taylor, obviously.

Are you sure about that? As a public school teacher I'm all for revisionist history but even this is a stretch. 

[m0nkey]

1 hour ago, Second Base said:

Are you sure about that? As a public school teacher I'm all for revisionist history but even this is a stretch. 

McCutchen was 30 and a year removed from a 4 year stretch where he was top 5 in the MVP each year.  Stanton was/is stanton, and he went on to hit 59 homers in his MVP year. Arenado was coming off back to back 40 HR years. Adam Jones provided the highlight of the whole WBC too

 

It's not Team USA basketball at the olympics but it's also not Team USA Olympic baseball bad.   

[Lou]

[Second Base]

4 hours ago, m0nkey said:

McCutchen was 30 and a year removed from a 4 year stretch where he was top 5 in the MVP each year.  Stanton was/is stanton, and he went on to hit 59 homers in his MVP year. Arenado was coming off back to back 40 HR years. Adam Jones provided the highlight of the whole WBC too

 

It's not Team USA basketball at the olympics but it's also not Team USA Olympic baseball bad.   

Cherry picking is cute. I can do that too. 

Cutch was coming off a season where he hit.256 with a .336 OBP. .336. 

Adam Jones was coming off a season where he hit .265/.310. A .310 OBP. .310. I repeat it for effect. What he did during the classic has nothing to do with him earning a spot on the team from his previous body of work from the prior season. 

Stanton was coming off a season where he hit .240 with 27 HR.  

-----

Now what I just did, was give an incredibly incomplete picture. Just like you. The honest assessment is that the roster wasn't nearly as good of a picture you paint and not nearly as bad as the picture I paint. 

And yet, my original point still stands. Cutch, Jones and Stanton is a far cry from Trout, Harper and Judge or Betts for that matter. 

[m0nkey]

54 minutes ago, Second Base said:

Cherry picking is cute. I can do that too. 

Cutch was coming off a season where he hit.256 with a .336 OBP. .336. 

Adam Jones was coming off a season where he hit .265/.310. A .310 OBP. .310. I repeat it for effect. What he did during the classic has nothing to do with him earning a spot on the team from his previous body of work from the prior season. 

Stanton was coming off a season where he hit .240 with 27 HR.  

-----

Now what I just did, was give an incredibly incomplete picture. Just like you. The honest assessment is that the roster wasn't nearly as good of a picture you paint and not nearly as bad as the picture I paint. 

And yet, my original point still stands. Cutch, Jones and Stanton is a far cry from Trout, Harper and Judge or Betts for that matter. 

I, too, would have liked to have seen 24 year old Aaron Judge with a 44% strikeout rate in the 2017 WBC

[Second Base]

3 minutes ago, m0nkey said:

I, too, would have liked to have seen 24 year old Aaron Judge with a 44% strikeout rate in the 2017 WBC

That's a fair point, which is why I said Betts the second time, because Judge in 2017 would've been like putting a 23 year old Alex Bergman on the roster after he had .313 OBP....

Now that would be ridiculous....

[Skankhunt42]

They should take one of the Latin teams from Pool D and switch them with a team from Pool A (not Cuba). 

[mmc]