WBC Wrap: Team Italy embarrasses Team USA

Wow. What an evening in the World Baseball Classic. All of a sudden, Team USA is in real danger of not making it out of pool play for the first time ever.

Pool A (San Juan):

Canada 3, Puerto Rico 2

Puerto Rico had already qualified for the quarterfinals, but Canada can now knock them out of the top seed after they beat Puerto Rico 3-2.

Former Twins reliever Jordan Balazovic started for Team Canada and got off to a rocky start. After he walked the first two batters, Nolan Arenado singled home the first run of the game [VIDEO] before an out was recorded in the bottom of the first.

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As you can see from that play, Canadian center fielder Denzel Clarke threw out Heliot Ramos trying to go from first to third on the play.

The score stayed 1-0 until the top of the third when Puerto Rico starter José De León couldn’t throw a strike. After recording the first two outs of the inning without issue, De León gave up singles to Clarke and Edouard Julien. Then De León hit Josh Naylor to load the bases and walked the next two batters, Tyler O’Neill and Tyler Black, to force in two runs and give Canada a 2-1 lead.

Canada increased the lead to 3-1 in the fourth when Owen Caissie doubled and Abraham Toro singled him home [VIDEO].

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Puerto Rico got to within 3-2 in the bottom of the fourth when Arenado scored on a Martin Maldonado ground out.

After that, the bullpens for Team Canada and Team Puerto Rico traded zeros the rest of the way. Canadian Brock Dykxhoorn, who has pitched the last six years professionally in Taiwan, retired the last nine Puerto Rico batters of the game in order to record the save. He also helped himself out with this defensive gem. [VIDEO]

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Canada plays Cuba today at 2 p.m. CT. Should Canada win, they will win the group with a 3-1 record and be a one-seed going into the quarter finals. Should Cuba win, Cuba will be the two-seed, Puerto Rico will be the one-seed and Canada will go home.

Pool B (Houston):

Italy 8, United States 6

Italy stunned Team USA by jumping out to an 8-0 lead in the sixth inning and surviving a furious comeback to win 8-6.

Mets pitcher Nolan McLean got the start in this one and he looked more like someone who has only 48 innings in the majors rather than a guy with 57 strikeouts in those 48 innings and a 2.06 career ERA. After striking out the Italy side in order in the first, Kyle Teel hit a solo home run off of him to put Italy up early. [VIDEO]

Next McLean hit Jac Caglianone. White Sox minor leaguer Sam Antonacci then made it 3-0 with another Italy home run. [VIDEO]

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Italy stretched the lead to 5-0 in the fourth inning when Caglianone hit a two-run home run off Ryan Yarborough. [VIDEO]

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Former Cub Brad Keller came on to pitch in the sixth inning with a man on second and one out. After walking Caglione, Keller looked to be out of trouble with a tailor-made double play on a grounder back to the mound. Except Keller made a bad throw to second base. [VIDEO]

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Team Italy would make it 7-0 in the inning on a sacrifice fly by Dante Nori and 8-0 on a wild pitch by Keller.

Team USA’s bats came alive after that and they almost mounted the biggest comeback in WBC history. Gunnar Henderson got things started with this tremendous solo home run in the bottom of the sixth. [VIDEO]

Cubs center fielder Pete Crow-Armstrong just missed a solo home run early in the game when the ball curved foul down the right field line. But PCA was not to be denied in the seventh inning, sending the ball 402 feet with two men on [VIDEO]

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Three straight singles after two out in the eighth inning by Kyle Schwarber, Will Smith and Roman Anthony cut the Team Italy lead down to 8-5.

In the bottom of the ninth inning, Crow-Armstrong did it again, going 377 feet to make it 8-6. [VIDEO]

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All of a sudden, it seemed possible that Team USA would pull this one out, especially after Bobby Witt Jr. singled after PCA’s second home run.

But Red Sox reliever Greg Weissert struck out Henderson and Aaron Judge to end the game.

Team USA finishes pool play at 3-1 and could miss going on to the quarterfinals if Mexico beats Italy tomorrow at 6 p.m. CT. Here are the scenarios as they stand now.

If Italy wins, they win the group and Team USA advances as the second seed.

Should Mexico win, there will be a three-way tie for two places at 3-1. Because each team would be 1-1 against the other two, the decision goes to fewest runs allowed divided by outs recorded. So basically, the two teams that allowed the fewest runs over their two games with the other teams advance.

Team USA has allowed 11 runs.

Italy has allowed 6 runs and still has Mexico to play

Mexico has allowed 5 runs and still has Italy to play.

So if Italy wins OR if Mexico wins and scores five or more runs, then Team USA will mostly likely advance. A tie will most likely go to Team USA because the third tiebreaker is earned runs allowed divided by outs recorded and three of the runs today were unearned. However, if the game goes to extra innings tied 4-4, then Mexico and Italy would advance on a 5-4 Mexico win, which is quite possible since Mexico is the home team.

Pool C (Tokyo):

It’s all over in Tokyo as Japan and Korea advance to the elimination rounds. But I wanted to show the standing ovation that the fans at the Tokyo Dome gave Czechia pitcher Ondrej Satoria, a full-time electrician and part-time baseball player who pitched 4.2 scoreless innings and struck out three against Japan yesterday morning.