![]() Through the group stage, Japan was dominant, as everyone expected. Team USA will defend their title against Samurai Japan. The 2023 World Baseball Classic has presented us with some amazing baseball from around the world, but in the end, the two teams left standing are the two who were pipped to be here at the outset. Welcome to the live commentary coverage of the USA vs Japan WBC final game here with Diario AS USA. If they want to win this game, they will need to capitalize on all of their scoring opportunities. They can not afford to do that against the USA. Japan stranded ten baserunners against Mexico. ![]() Japan will need him to better that tonight. His walkoff double got them here, but he had gone 0 for 4 prior to that with three strikeouts. While the Japanese have a powerful lineup behind Nootbaar, Ohtani, and Yoshida, the element that they have lacked is a true breakout performance from the NPB's triple crown winner. The biggest key to the game may be Munetaka Murakami. Two or three scoreless innings however, would give that Japanese bullpen a fighting chance. Japan will need Shōta Imanaga to keep the score to a minimum it may be too much to hope for him to shut the USA down. The USA is one of the best ever assembled on paper and there are signs that they may be finally shaking of their torpor. But tonight they are in the fight of their life. Japan came into the World Baseball Classic as perhaps the most complete team in the competition. Rob Manfred has announced that the WBC will "100%" be back in 2026 and that is perhaps the best news of all. They have been excellent throughout the competition and played their hearts out in this final. Team USA should go away from this with their heads held high. ![]() Japan now are the only team to have won the World Baseball Classic three times, and they are back on top of the baseball world. Wow! That was the moment that every baseball fan lives for. ![]() Feeding Trout straight heat, the count ran full and Ohtani gave him a hard slider for a swinging strike three. And Ohtani didn't back down from the challenge. One's best pitch against the other's best swing. The best player in Japan versus the best player in America, for the bragging rights to say which is the best in the world. He got the first two outs and then the drama ratcheted up a gear. But that is where the USA's attack faltered.Īnd then, drama of all drama, Shohei Ohtani was brought on as a closer. In shades of the 2022 NLCS, Kyle Schwarber did to Yu Darvish what he did then and took a low pitch to right field for a solo shot to pull back a run. Nootbaar sacrificed in a run and then Kazuma Okamoto hit another solo shot an inning later to make it 3-1, and that is where it stayed, with these two heavyweights standing toe-to-toe and trading blows, nobody wavering, until the eighth. But Japan came roaring back in the bottom half of the inning with a 432-foot moon shot off the bat of Munetaka Murakami. The game got off to a huge start with Mr Automatic, Trea Turner putting up another home run, his fifth of this tournament, to open the scoring in the second. ![]() When world heavyweight champions want to legitimize their title, they have to fight other champions. These two teams were always destined to meet here, anything else would have been an asterisk next to the title. The drama was already set before the game. WBC ends in dramatic fashion as Japan win third title ![]()
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