Tag Archives: Mexico

World Baseball Classic News for 12-17-2015: Catching Up

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It’s time to catch up on some World Baseball Classic news!

 

Lincoln Holdzkom passes away

First off, though, there is tragic news out of California, where New Zealander-American pitcher Lincoln Holdzkom has passed away after a car accident. Holdzkom, the brother of John Holdzkom of the Pirates organization, was expected to be the team captain for New Zealand in the WBC Qualifiers. Our thoughts are with him and his family and friends.

Mexico’s roster starts to take shape

Jon Morosi has an article on the Mexican National Team that has begun to take shape. Edgar Gonzalez will be the manager for Team Mexico in the WBC Qualifiers and presumably the main tournament as well if they qualify. His younger brother, Adrian Gonzalez, will be on the roster. The team could be pretty deep in pitching, Morosi writes:

Mexico’s preliminary roster will be especially deep in pitching, with Yovani Gallardo, Marco Estrada, Roberto Osuna, Aaron Sanchez, Miguel Gonzalez and Dodgers prospect Julio Urias among the notable arms certain to be included on it. Pitchers Jorge De La Rosa, Joakim Soria and Olivez Perez also are eligible to play for Mexico, as is Dodgers outfielder Andre Ethier, who is Mexican-American.

However, there are some problems that could trip up Mexico. For one thing, while MLB teams are very strongly encouraged to allow players to participate in the qualifiers, they are not required (unlike the main rounds of the WBC, where they are only allowed to officially block player participation if they are coming off an injury or there are too many players being picked from their roster). In addition, there is an ongoing feud between the Mexican League and Mexico’s national baseball federation that will make the participation of Mexican Leaguers iffy.

Edwin Rodriguez will begin recruiting for Team Puerto Rico

In a Spanish-language article on Elnuevodia.com, there is the news that Edwin Rodriguez will soon begin to recruit for Team Puerto Rico. While the article mentions how he will try to make an effort to get players of Puerto Rican descent (like Jake Arrieta) to take part, I personally think it’s more likely they’ll have to rely upon native-born Puerto Ricans like Yadier Molina, Carlos Beltran, Angel Pagan, Carlos Correa, Francisco Lindor, and the like. All of them are mentioned in the article. Puerto Rico came in a surprising second in the 2013 WBC.

Other Notes:

So, until next time, this has been a WBC update!

World Baseball Classic News for 9-17-2015: Qualifier Pools Announced!

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Well, I told you that more news was probably coming, and today it was confirmed, as the World Baseball Classic qualifying pools have been announced! They are (all qualifiers in 2016):

 

Qualifier 1 (Sydney, Australia on February 11-14th):

Australia

New Zealand

Philippines

South Africa

Qualifier 2 (Mexicali, Mexico on March 17-20th):

Mexico

Czech Republic

Germany

Nicaragua

Qualifier 3 (Panama City on March 17-20th):

Colombia

France

Panama

Spain

Qualifier 4 (Brooklyn on Sept. 22-25th):

Brazil

Great Britain

Israel

Pakistan

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As you can see, they’ve mixed up the locations (only Panama is a return qualifying host), the pools (no pool has more than two teams that were in the same individual pool last time), and also teams (Pakistan has replaced Thailand). Some things to note here:

  • MLB players will be able to participate in Qualifiers 1-3, but not Qualifier 4.
  • It is again a modified double-elimination, meaning it’s double elimination until there are only two, at which point it’s a winner-take-all championship game. I’ve always had a problem with this format and feel a straight-up double-elimination would be better, but I understand how the organizers would like the drama of a winner-take-all game.
  • Qualifier 4, in Brooklyn, is clearly meant to be a pool of teams that don’t have pro-worthy stadiums in their countries. It’s likely Brooklyn was picked due to New York’s diverse nature, with MLB and the other WBC organizers no doubt hoping that the city’s large Jewish population will turn up for Israel games.
  • Looking at this right now, I’d say that Qualifier 2 will probably have the highest level of talent, Qualifier 3 will be the hardest for any one team to get out of, and Qualifier 4 will be the hardest to predict. Qualifier 1, by contrast, looks like it should be a fairly easy draw for Australia.
  • I’m somewhat surprised that the Philippines is in Qualifier 1. I had a feeling they might make it an All-Commonwealth pool and have the Philippines be in New York City. At least, that’s what I thought after reading Jon Paul Morosi’s original post before it was official.

 

So, look in the coming days and no doubt more news will come out and I’ll take a look at some of the teams and other aspects of the qualifying tournament- like Pakistan’s baseball program.

 

WBC News for September 9, 2015: Some other stuff

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There’s some other World Baseball Classic news I forgot to get to yesterday:

First off, way back in April, Russell Martin said he’s totally up for another go-around for Canada in 2017. He infamously missed the 2013 Classic because he wanted to play middle-infield.

In March, Jon Morosi- the biggest WBC booster amongst mainstream MLB writers- talked a bit about it. The 12 teams that didn’t finish last in their groups (Canada, China, Chinese Taipei, Cuba, Dominican Republic, Italy, Japan, Netherlands, Puerto Rico, South Korea, United States and Venezuela) will automatically get a bid. No major changes are expected in the actual WBC itself, although the teams that finished last in their groups (Mexico, Australia, Brazil and Spain) will have to go through qualifiers to qualify again. He indicated that Mexico, Germany, Australia and Panama were the likely places to hold qualifiers, due to facilities and likelihood to participate. He estimated that most qualifiers would occur in September and/or November of 2016, although he says that Australia may host in February of 2016 after the end of their league’s season but before Spring Training.

Speaking of which, the New Zealand baseball federation’s twitter feed implied that, indeed, there will be an Australian-based qualifier in February next year. However, I personally e-mailed Australia’s baseball federation asking about where they stand as far as the WBC, and they said that they have yet to hear from WBC Inc. (the company formed by Major League Baseball, the MLBPA, the IBAF and other professional leagues to manage the tournament), although they do know they will, as expected, have to go through qualifiers. It’s possible, perhaps even likely, that there will be a qualifying round in Australia in February 2016, but it’s definitely not official yet.

Finally, there was some talk that the Mexican portion of the qualifiers would be held in Mexicali, Hermosillo, or Monterrey.

Remember to follow the Baseball Continuum for more WBC news as it comes out in the coming weeks, months and years.

 

First References in “The Sporting News”: The Caribbean

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One of the great perks of SABR membership is access online to The Sporting News’ archives. While it now is dedicated to all sports, for a good chunk of it’s earlier history it was almost entirely focused on baseball. This allows us to see how players, ideas, teams and even countries first got the attention of the baseball press. So, similar to my article on the first references to Japanese baseball, here’s a look at the first references to baseball in the Caribbean in the Sporting News archives…. just in time for the Caribbean World Series in February!

(go below the jump for the article)

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Picture of the day: Fernando-Mania never died

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Mexico may not have advanced in the WBC, but they certainly were popular with the fans during their time there. Just look at the crowd trying to get pitching coach and Mexican baseball legend Fernando Valenzuela to sign for them before a exhibition game against the Dodgers:

This picture, taken by “rwarrin”, is under a creative commons license.

Headlines for March 10, 2013

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Looking at how newspapers from around the world are covering baseball, thanks to the Newseum’s front pages page:

Subject: Canada-Mexico WBC Fight

Toronto Star: “A ball game to make Don Cherry proud”

Vanguardia (Saltillo): “Derrota y Trifulca” (roughly translated as “Defeat and Roughhouse” or “Loss and Roughhouse”)

Apologies for the very small post and the lack of any posts yesterday, I’ve been feeling a bit under the weather.

WBC News and… Dickey vs. the Mexican National Team (and Gallardo vs. USA)

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Okay, here’s the WBC news for today: Brett Lawrie hurt his ribcage, and Deolis Guerra also is out of the WBC.

Got that? Okay, good, now, time for a little bit of a preview for the USA-Mexico game tonight. It should be a treat, with reports coming that the game is close to a sell-out, with the crowd expected to be an even split between the USA and Mexico (a common occurrence in games featuring the Mexican national teams, to the extent where the American national soccer team plays many of it’s games against Mexico in northern cities like Columbus and Seattle to ensure it’s mainly an American crowd).

For Team USA, it’s an important game in order to get the WBC off to a good start. But for Mexico, this is an all-but-must-win game, after their shocking upset by Italy yesterday. And in the center of this is R.A. Dickey. He played for Team USA in the 1996 Olympics (and Brandon Phillips was the bat-boy!), but this is his first time in the WBC. So, how have Team Mexico’s hitters done in the past against Dickey:

Jorge Cantu: 3-8, 2B, BB, SO

Luis Cruz: 0-1

Ramiro Pena: 0-3

Gil Velazquez: 2-5, SO

…And that’s it. Those are the only players on Team Mexico that have met Dickey in MLB play. Knuckleballers are so hit and miss, of course, that there is no way of possibly knowing how the game could turn out, or how the other players could fare the first time they see the knuckler.

On the flip-side, here’s how the expected lineup for Team USA has done against Yovani Gallardo, the Mexican starter (this includes postseason play, by the way):

Jimmy Rollins: 2-10, SO

Brandon Phillips: 9-37, 3 2B, HR, 5 SO, 2 BB

Ryan Braun: None, since Braun and Gallardo both have played with the Brewers their entire careers

Joe Mauer: 5-10, 2 SO, 2 BB

David Wright: 3-16, HR, 8 SO, 3 BB

Eric Hosmer: None.

Giancarlo Stanton: 3-9, 2B, 3 SO

Adam Jones: None.

J.P. Arencibia: None.

So, there you have it: the histories between Team USA and Team Mexico’s hitters and today’s starting pitchers. Enjoy the games.

World Baseball Classic Preview: Pool D (Arizona)

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USA. Canada. Mexico. Italy. Those are the four teams in the D Pool of the World Baseball Classic.

Go below the jump for the preview:

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2013 WBC Projections: Mexico

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Mexico is a bit of an engima. They play lots of baseball in Mexico, but it’s still far from the passion they have for futbol. They have a big professional league of their own that is regarded by MLB as being about AAA level, yet they don’t have that many Major Leaguers, although they are bolstered by some players who were born in the USA but spent much of their childhood in Mexico.

Therefore, Mexico is a bit harder to project, as they have very few MLB players but plenty of ballplayers overall. Thus this involved far more research and statistical searching to compile than, say, the previous WBC projections. That said, I have come up with a roster that fits the criteria I have been following so far:

As always, these are the rules of how I pick this roster, a combination of the official WBC rules on rosters and some unwritten rules that emerged during the first two tournaments:

  • Any player coming off a major injury or who has a history of injuries is unlikely to participate. This is especially true for the pitchers.
  • Players that will be on new teams are less likely to participate, but shouldn’t be completely ignored, with the exception of pitchers.
  • Teams are made up of 28 players, of which 13 of them must be pitchers and two of them catchers.
  • The pitch count rules make relievers extremely important.

Therefore, without further ado, my projections for the 2013 Mexican National Team (after the jump)

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