Team USA’s Soulless Militarism Was Their Undoing in the WBC |
Team USA’s Soulless Militarism Was Their Undoing in the WBC
In the final of this surprisingly thrilling and utterly joyful World Baseball Classic, Venezuela outplayed their sour opponents.
This year’s World Baseball Classic was, by most metrics, a smashing success for the sport. Venezuela’s 3-2 victory over the United States in Tuesday’s final cemented its status as a great baseball power. Many of the country’s players and coaches, some of whom have won World Series titles or been inducted in the Hall of Fame, were overcome with emotion after representing their homeland.
Other great stories abounded during the two-week tournament. Korea, buoyed by a raft of young KBO stars, made it out of the group stage for the first time ever. Italy’s Cinderella run to the semifinals began with an upset win over Team USA. Czechia held powerhouse Japan to a single run until the ninth inning in their match last week. Ondrej Satoria, a full-time electrician by trade, pitched four scoreless innings against the reigning champions, and Japanese fans gave him a standing ovation when he bid farewell to the Tokyo Dome.
One of the thrills of international competition is relishing our unique differences. Team Italy, which was almost entirely comprised of Italian Americans playing under an ancestral flag, took espresso shots after each home run and bedecked the successful slugger in an Armani jacket. Mexico festooned players in a sombrero for their home-run celebration, while Great Britain’s players donned a beefeater uniform, complete with the iconic bearskin hat. The Dominican players danced and celebrated at every opportunity, not limiting themselves to just the biggest hits.
The only real exception in this tournament of joy was Team USA. Few of the players appeared to take any real pleasure or personal pride in playing in the WBC. Some seemed to treat it as a mere extension of spring training. Tarik Skubal, the Detroit Tigers ace and a reigning Cy Young Award winner, pitched in a group-level game against Great Britain and then went back to training camp, declining to participate in further stages. (He was still on hand in Miami on Tuesday night to receive a silver medal.)
Even when they won in the group stages, the USA dugout appeared dour and joyless. For other teams it was thrilling to play alongside their countrymen, outside the bounds of the usual professional teams with which they played, and to represent their countries on the international stage. Team USA players declined to draw upon our nation’s own cultural heritage. Instead they acted like they were at war.
First came a widely publicized moment between Team USA catcher Cal Raleigh and Mexican outfielder Randy Arozarena. During one at bat, Arozarena extended a friendly hand to shake with Raleigh. The men know each other well—after all, they play together on the Seattle Mariners. Raleigh didn’t move a muscle. Arozarena, understandably so, took it as a personal insult. In a postgame Spanish-language interview, Arozarena explained how he felt in greater detail:
“I’d like to tell him in four languages, that’s what I’d like,” Arozarena said. “First I’ll tell him in Spanish, look. All he has to do is thank God he has such wonderful parents, yeah? That his parents are very well-mannered. I got to see them two days ago at the hotel, and they went to say hi, they gave me a hug. Said they were very proud of me and happy to see me again. The other thing I want to say to him, I’ll tell it to him Cuban-style. What he needs to do is go fuck himself. Mexican-style: He can go fuck himself. And in English, I’m gonna say it to him in English. That ‘good to see you’ he gave me? He can shove........