Israel beats South Korea 2-1 at World Baseball Classic

If they defeat the Netherlands, the Israelis will automatically advance to the second round. Josh Zeid returned to the mound for his third inning of work and preserved Israel’s 2-1 lead with a fly out and two strike outs.

Israel, playing its first Classic, made its entry ranked just 41 but has shown it’s a force to be reckoned with, notching wins over 3rd and 4th ranked South Korea and Chinese Taipei respectively. Israel can already consider the 2017 tournament a major success.

Israel’s fairy-tale run at the World Baseball Classic continued on Tuesday with a resounding 15-7 rout of Chinese Taipei in Seoul, moving the blue-and-white to the brink of qualification for the last eight of the tournament.

Taiwan next plays the Netherlands and its major league infield on Wednesday afternoon and finishes group play on Thursday against South Korea.

Netherlands has a good chance to advance with another victory after beating South Korea, 5-0. Second-round games will be in San Diego and Tokyo, while the championship round is at Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles from March 20-22.

“It’s been a ideal trip in every regard”.

“I think the key to the WBC’s success is to have the best possible rosters we can have”, Manfred said.

The Israeli team is comprised of mostly American Jews who are able to play due to a tournament rule that players must only be eligible for citizenship in a country to represent it. Israel’s Law of Return gives every Jew the right to immigrate to Israel and obtain citizenship.

Manager Jerry Weinstein’s merry band of misfits upset Korea on Monday in the opening game of the WBC. They will face Chinese Taipei – who will be without a number of their nation’s top players due to a boycott.

Israel scored the first run of the contest on a bases-loaded walk to Tyler Krieger in the second, and South Korea tied it in the fifth on a ground single to left by Seo Geon-chang.

The game was not broadcast on any of Israel’s major television channels or sports channels. The World Baseball Classic allows players with multiple national affiliations to choose which country they want to play for, be it a country in which they are a naturalized citizen, the country of their birth or the country of a parent’s birth.

Meet the Mensch on the Bench! We’ve got great people on this team. Chinese Taipei’s team has three-year experience of competing in this global championship.

“It’s more than just Israel”, Ty Kelly, who is on the New York Mets’ top minor league team, told Reuters during the team’s January promotional tour in Israel.

Robert Stephenson struck out four and allowed no hits or walks in two innings against the Chicago Cubs on Friday. Burcham and Sam Fuld, a former Stanford University and Oakland Athletics outfielder, had two hits apiece for Israel.

Not that it mattered in Game 1.

“Yeah, a good dad stayed up all night”, he said in an email.