Cowboys Update

I am going to take a little break from my 24/7 coverage of the World Baseball Classic here and report an update on the signing of Igor "Ukraine NOT WEAK!" Olshansky.

I am hoping that he does well as a Cowboy, and maybe I will throwout my copy of the workout book written by T.O. and buy some of Igor's MEGA PRODUCTS.

I will now counter the gayness (although there is nothing wrong with that) of posting a picture if a half naked muscle dude, by posting these following pictures:

Happy Super Terrific Hour!

Alison Carroll as Lara Croft

Dutch Boys Knock Out Team Short Stops

" There are only two things I can't stand in this world. People who are intolerant of other people's cultures... and the Dutch."

- Nigel Powers

The Dominican Republic was upset for the second time in one week by the Dutch squad.

The early exit came in the most unexpected fashion. The Dominican Republic, with three Major League short stops on its roster (apparently they needed one more) , lost the game in 11 innings on an infield error by Willy Aybar (the defensive replacement for David Ortiz).

The 11th inning started with the Jose Reyes scoring the game's first run to take a 1-0 lead. Netherlands comes right back and ties the game 1-1. With a runner at first base, two costly errors by the Dominican Republic infielders who aren't short stops, allow the runner to advance to third and score the winning run.

Alright, I may be a little bit unfair in that last paragraph. One of the errors was the pitcher (well, he's technically also an infielder) throwing the ball away on a pick off, and Hanley Remirez was the DH, and hence not on the field. Robinson Cano was playing second base.

Still, this has to be a painful exit. Favored to take it all and not even getting out of the first round. I attribute this to the baseball gods punishing them for lying about their age.

Big Q, I want the truth. You had money on the D.R. winning this game, didn't you.

Canada Gets Bounced From WBC

Two days after North America's team signed Terrell Owens, Canada gets bounced from the World Baseball Classic. This was somewhat of a surprise, as the Canadians looked pretty good against the Americans, and they were expected to get past Italy and possibly challenge / knock off Venezuela.

Sunday and Monday has not been kind to the host nations. First, the favored Mexican team was upset by Australia; not enough just to lose in front of the home crowd - they were embarrassed in a game called after 8 innings by mercy rule. 8 Mexican pitchers combined to give up a WBC record 22 hits and 17 runs. I think they might even have brought in a couple of ball boys to toss a couple of innings. Mexico is really in bad shape here, they are forced to play an elimination game against South Africa with a depleted bullpen.

Sixth inning call to the bullpen."Yeah, I'm almost ready."

Monday morning started off with me waking up to see Japan losing the top spot in Pool A to Korea in a pitchers' dual. This game was what I was expecting out of Asia's top two squads, but I am somewhat confused about the scheduling of this game. I had thought the format of pool play in this tournament was double elimination, and in double elimination formats - the team advancing from the losers' bracket must beat the winners' bracket team twice to take the top spot. Maybe I am just being selfish, hoping DiceK blows out his arm before the MLB season.

Monday evening saw Don Cherry and his awesome outfit throw out the first pitch at the Sky Dome in Toronto, then saw the no name Italians make spaghetti O's out of our neighbors to the north.

I know I am going to disappoint some of you people, I do not have any new updates on the state of Taiwanese baseball. As far as I know, no one has been machine gunned while standing outside making a phone call. Yet.

However, I did do a quick search on the Chinese American short stop Raymond Chang. This Fort Wayne Baseball site has a nice article about him. I'll be cheering for this kid to make it to the bigs.

Update: Mexico has pulled ahead of South Africa 6-2, in the top of the seventh. El Tri proceeded to give back one run in the bottom of the frame. Mexico has used 3 pitchers thus far (the starter did his part, pitched 6 strong innings giving up only 2 runs), they are praying that their bullpen can hold up. Or maybe they're pulling a Team Korea strategy, tanking early and winning the last game for the pool.

Okay USA!

Team USA clinches an automatic bid to the second round of the World Baseball Classic tonight by trouncing Venezuela 15-6.

This is something you don't see everyday

The U.S. team overcame a 3-2 deficit and a 1 for 6 performance by the American League reigning MVP Dustin Pedroia by putting the game out of reach with an 8 run sixth inning.

I am happy with this result for a couple of reasons. One, it's team USA. Two, the win comes at the expense of Venezuela. Yes, I will concede that they have the hottest women on the planet, but they also have that nut job Hugo Chavez, who along with Massachusetts' Joe Kennedy, are probably the two finalists in the regionals of the anti-American Kumite.

Both Adam Dunn and Kevin Youkilis homered for the Americans second game in a row, and Chris Iannetta along with DeRosa contributed with key RBI hits, blew open a close 3-2 contest.

Much of the credit should go to the American bats, but after the Venezuelan starter Armando Galarraga was chased after four innings, the Venezuelan bullpen didn't have an answer for the American firepower.

The fallout continues in Taiwan over their quick exit from the WBC.

A little personal note here, the senior commentator Fu Da-jen quoted in the article above, was the MC at our wedding in Taiwan. Now I think back, that was pretty cool. I wish I knew ahead of time that he is famous in Taiwan for broadcasting NBA games, hell, I would of had him pimp our entrance into the wedding reception. Maybe some sort of Jabbawockeez intro a la the All Star game or maybe, or something simpler like "At point guard, 5'-6" from Nooooooortheastern.."; or even better - I could have thrown talcum powder into the air instead of toasting people.

Damn, the Marv Albert of Taiwan was the MC at my wedding, and I failed to capitalize on it. I suck.

There is NO CRYING IN BASEBALL!

Team Boli Stunned by Netherlands

Team Netherlands upset the heavily favored Dominican Republic 3-2.

Ouch. This has to be the biggest upset thus far in the short history of the WBC. Winning pitcher for the Netherlands? Fat Sid.

The other surprise in WBC action today is Japan's rout of South Korea. Team Japan winning was not that much of a surprise, but the final score was. The game ended in seven innings, due to the newly instituted mercy rule (15 runs after 5 and 10 runs after 7).

Pundits in Japan was questioning the strength of the Japanese team, as they only beat the fourth seeded team China by a score of 4-0. Coming into this tournament, fresh off of their gold medal in the Beijing Olympics, team Korea was actually the favorite.

Mercy rule loss. I think I owe Chinese Taipei an apology, they're not the most gutless team in this tournament. Oh wait, they lost to China last night. Never mind.

Speaking of Chinese Crap-Pei, their fans are not taking the failure at the WBC very well. A couple of the baseball web bulletin boards had to shut down today, due to the threats of violence and use profanity towards the national team. Words like "embarrassment" and "national shame" were being tossed around, and those were the ones they can print in the newspapers. People have called for the ouster of the president as well as the management of the national baseball team.

That sounds about right. Let's see, the mainlanders started playing baseball, what, 6 years ago? and Taiwan is the only team they have beaten (twice in a row now) in international competition.

Chinese Taipei's stay in the World Baseball Classic was 21 hours. Fortunately (or unfortunately, depending on if they were planning on using it as an excuse) they didn't have to travel across time zones; hell, they probably didn't even need a hotel - they could have just kept their luggage in one of those airport lockers.

In the latest news from Taiwan, there are several legislators calling for new special tax incentives for corporate sponsored baseball teams. Wow, I guess they really care about their baseball.

This chick looks pissed.

I am placing the blame for the losses completely on this chick with the overused palms out victory sign

Chinese Crap-Pei Routed by South Korea

Final score: South Korea 9, Chinese Taipei 0.

This follows China being blanked by defending WBC Champion Japan 4-0 on Thursday morning.

With 1/5th of the World's population, they can't find one guy to score in the World Baseball Classic.

The two Chinese sides are currently playing an elimination game, where the winner gets the right to be spanked by South Korea or Japan again.

My Korean American friend, whom I shall only identify as "BALCO", was pretty giddy over these events.

I have one answer for you Balco, wait until the World Ping-pong classic, we'll see who's ass is getting beat.

Update: The People's baseball team used a combination of strong people's pitching and timely people's hitting, triumphed over the capitalist pigs of Taiwan, 4-1.

The shortstop for team China, Raymond Chang, is an American. Born in Kansas and is currently in the Pittsburgh Pirates farm system.

Despite his questionable practice of looking like Julian Tavarez in his WBC profile picture, had himself a big day at the plate - 3 for 4 and 2 RBI's.

I am taking comfort in the fact that Team China has two farmhands from the Yankees, and Taipei has two from the Red Sox. So this is in effect win number one for the Yankees.

I will leave you all with the immortal words of Tom Tuttle from Tacoma, Washington.

Ukraine is Game to You?

Dallas is looking at Igor Olshansky formerly of the San Diego Chargers to replace Canty at the Defensive End spot.

Matt Mosley of ESPN.com has this to say:

"Olshansky would challenge Jason Hatcher and Stephen Bowen to replace Chris Canty at defensive end. He also fits the team's desire to sign more players from the former Soviet Union."

Wise ass.

Looking at Mr. Olshansky's profile, he is in fact from the former Soviet Union - more specifically, the Ukraine.

Of course, that calls for the obligatory Seinfeld reference.