Wednesday, December 07, 2005

World Baseball Classic

Amidst all the Carl Everett for Mickey Brantley trade rumors, something else has caught my eye in the baseball world. Next spring's World Baseball Classic is going o include some freaking good players.

Check out some of these squads:

Dominican Republic
Beltre, Colon, Vlad, Pedro, Big Papi, Pujols, Manny, Soriano, Tejada

Puerto Rico
Beltran, Delgado, Pudge, Piniero (where's Edgar?)

USA
Bonds, Buerhle, Chavez, Clemens, Crawford, Damon, Guardado, Halladay, Jeter, Peavy, Rollins, Teixeira, Utley, Willis, etc.

Venezuela
Abreu, Freddy and Carlos!, Mora, Santana, Zambrano

If all these players end up playing, this is going to be pretty sweet.

6 comments:

  1. Whoa!! LOTS of talent on these teams! When is this going to take place? In amongst all the depressing Mariners-related rumors of mediocre free-agent signings and trades gone bust, I haven't really been paying attention. Thanks for posting this, it will give some of us something else to think about (the glory of the game of baseball itself) besides the gloomier aspects of baseball as a business.

    Don't get me wrong, I love Hot Stove time, but I'm feeling increasingly discouraged by what's beein happening there so far this year...

    ReplyDelete
  2. i think that the world baseball classic would be cool if they treated it like the soccer world cup, or like hockey does with the olympics - stop the season when everyone is in shape, and let them play all out for their countries. if mlb was smart, they would do that - even if it was just every other year, or even every 4 years - and use it as a marketing tool. you could play up the u-s-a, u-s-a angle of it and get americans interested in baseball again. imagine u.s. vs. dominican. that dr team is sick - mike even left out k-rod as their closer. colon and pedro with k-rod closing over a short series would be amazing. so, it would actually mean something if the u.s. won (unlike the dream team and their sorry ass progeny who now get shut down by the players who ask for their autographs after the game) and people could get fired up, and follow players after the tournament was over (rememeber ben sheets and the rest of that team that won at the olympics with tommy lasorda? people loved those guys) - are you listening bud selig?!?!? even canada could be okay with a healthy gagne and a hot hitting jason bay and larry walker. they could even do it every two years between olympics, and it would be a great way to convince the ioc that baseball needs to be back in the olympics. but, the way that it is, its going to be like the mtv rock and jock softball game. pitchers will have pitch limits, etc., teams (like the m's with felix) are going to try to keep their young stars out of the game, and since it is early in spring training, nobody will be in prime shape. its a promising concept, but unfortunately it's not there yet.

    ReplyDelete
  3. sorry - i checked again and k-rod would be closing for venezuela's big 3 of santana, zambrano, and freddy. francisco cordero (just as good) would be closing for dr.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Anonymous12:16 PM

    great idea Chris...b aseball could dominate teh world stage for a few weeks during the MLB regular season..then A-Rod would have to REALLY considr if he was an American or a Dominican if it was more meaningful and in Prime Time !!!

    what are the M's goign to end up with --resigning JAmie and good ol' Carl Everett and hope for the best ??--as said earlier by Chrois--maybe that'd put us in good shape for teh post 2006 dealing that makes us a better tema in '07 and '08

    ReplyDelete
  5. Ugh... at least they got someone who sounds like he could be a decent bullpen guy in exchange for Torrealba. His name is Carvajal, and supposedly he hits 97 on the radar. He's 21, he's a righthander, he was 0-2 with something like a 5.09 ERA for the Rockies last year... 53 innings, 21 BB, 47 Ks... I think we got more than just a warm body or a bucket of baseballs in exchange for Yorvit, anyway... just trying to find something positive from this year's Winter Meeting experience...

    ReplyDelete
  6. My favorite one is Mike Piazza playing for Italy. The guy grew up In Eastern Pa.

    ReplyDelete

Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.