Fortune has recently favored team Venezuela in the 2017 edition of the World Baseball Classic. Despite losing to Mexico in their final pool stage match, the Venezuelans still managed to set up a tiebreaker game against Italy by virtue of having fewer runs allowed per inning played than the Mexicans.
In turn, Venezuela escaped said tiebreaker contest with a 4-3 win over the Italians on Monday to advance to the second round of the WBC for the third time in four trips to the tournament. Two-time AL MVP Miguel Cabrera tied the game at two runs apiece with a solo homer in the ninth before Rougned Odor knocked in the go-ahead run late to give his team the lead for good.
As you could imagine with Cabrera and Odor, Venezuela does indeed have a wealth of superb hitters in its lineup, which also includes other MLB standouts like Jose Altuve and Carlos Gonzalez. The team will also be glad to have Felix Hernandez as the starter for Wednesday’s clash against the United States.
However, Hernandez hasn’t quite been his royal self in the tournament thus far. He pitched less than three innings and took the loss in his first start, allowing two hits and one earned run in a 11-0 humiliation against Pool D winners Puerto Rico. Manager Omar Vizquel better show more faith unto the former Cy Young Award winner, or else the Venezuelans can pretty much kiss their WBC title hopes goodbye as early as Friday.
After squandering a five-run lead in the crushing loss to the Dominican republic, team USA proved that they still had what it takes to make a fourth-consecutive trip to the second round of the WBC by handily shutting out team Canada on Monday, 8-0.
The Americans’ offensive wealth was on full display that evening, with Nolan Arenado going yard for a three-run blast and with Buster Posey chipping in with a couple of hits and three RBIs of his own. Starter Danny Duffy was just as impressive, having allowed just two hits across four scoreless innings to pick up the win.
Seattle Mariners fans may want to make a quick trip to Southern Cali for Friday’s contest, as Drew Smyly will be team USA’s starter opposite of Venezuela’s Hernandez. While Smyly’s body of work in the big leagues pales in comparison to King Felix’s, the southpaw from Arkansas is a fresh arm for the Americans ready to make his first start in the tournament. Smyly’s small sample size of five scoreless innings of one-hit ball from Spring Training is also quite encouraging.
Furthermore, the Americans will have the benefit of playing in the friendly confines of Petco Park, whereas Venezuela would have to make a trip out to US soil after playing all four of their first-round matches in Mexico. You can bet that the partisan crowd in San Diego will cheer loudly for their beloved Red, White and Blue, and team USA will definitely feed off the fans’ energy once more. In their three games of the tournament thus far – all played at Marlins Park in Miami – they’ve scored an average of 5.3 runs against some stellar pitching from the likes of the Dominican Republic’s Edinson Volquez and Colombia’s Jose Quintana.
Writer’s Prediction
Team USA (-170) ekes out a 6-4 victory over the Venezuelans.
