Effectively Wild: A FanGraphs Baseball Podcast - Effectively Wild Episode 161: Breaking Down the WBC

Episode Date: March 18, 2013

Ben and Sam talk to Ian Miller about his WBC experience and the response to the tournament in the US and abroad.

Yeah, it's our game. But again, I think it's a compliment to our game that so many other countries have caught on pretty good. Good morning and welcome to episode 161 of Effectively Wild, the daily podcast from Baseball Perspectives. It is a new week, which is why we are starting on episode 161. Ben Lindberg, how are you doing? Very well, thank you. Excited to start a new week? Yeah, on a multiple of one. I guess they're all of one. Otherwise not excited at all? No, just excited about the one starting the week. And we're joined today by Ian Miller, who just got back not minutes, well, I guess yes minutes ago from the first semi-final game of the World Baseball Classic in San Francisco.

Ian, how are you? I'm well. Thanks for having me, guys. Yeah, we're having you because we want to talk about the World Baseball Classic, but I don't think either of us is qualified to. I actually have yet to see a single pitch because I don't have the MLB network and I can't. Oh, my God. I'm not apparently allowed to watch it any other way.

And I'm also unable to listen to it so far as I can tell where I live. So I'm way out of it, but I do want to know about it. So you've been to obviously tons of games at Pac-El Park in your life. What is different about going to a WBC game well let's see um first of all they played three national anthems tonight that was kind of cool there was the Puerto Rican national anthem um and they get they get a national anthem even though they're what are they they're like a protectorate or something I'm not even sure they're a nation but they did have an anthem it was lovely this is the same person does the same person perform all three these were all pre-recorded

okay include including the u.s one um instrumental or vocal instrumental non-vocal uh so we we got the puerto rican national anthem first and then the japanese national anthem and i was sitting in a predominantly japanese section and a lot of of the Japanese fans sang along. It was actually quite touching, even for a man with a cold black heart like me. It was fairly touching to hear folks singing along. It was great. Is the seating random, or is it intentional that you would be in the Japanese section and then there would be a Puerto Rican section? Well, that's a good question. We were sitting in our normal season seats at AT&T, which are sort of alongside the home team's bullpen. And Japan was the home team. So they were the folks who had the dugout down the third baseline. And there were a lot of Japanese folks there. I could look across the diamond and see down the first baseline a very festive uh rather large section of Puerto Rico fans

who were going off the entire night uh so I'm going to assume that there was some rhyme and reason to that and that folks uh ended up behind the team's dugout of which they supported that's not to say that there weren't Puerto Rican fans sprinkled in with us because there were, but everybody was cool. Everybody was friendly. There was nothing of Giants, Dodgers or Red Sox, Yankees type vibe at all. Everybody was good natured. There's a little bit of ribbing, but everybody in the stands was on their best behavior. And other than sort of a lackluster

game on the field, it was a great night all around. So were the Japanese fans doing the things that we have heard about Japanese fans doing, like cool chants and stuff? have heard about Japanese fans doing like cool chants and stuff? There was a specific chant for each player. Um, and it was generally that player's last name, you know, sort of chanted in a rhythmic fashion as chants tend to be. Um, I noticed that for Shinosuke Abe, the cleanup hitting catcher, uh, they chanted his first name, um, as opposed to his his last name but I think for everybody else it was their last name and it was cool there was a large section out in the center field

there were left center field bleachers sort of a mini college band type thing where it was fully orchestrated and conducted and lots of the chants emanated from there. There were tons of thundersticks out that way.

Not many thundersticks in our section, thank God. But lots of folks chanting along with the chants that originated out in the bleachers. Do you – you might not know this, so if you don't know it, it's no problem. I wouldn't actually expect you to know it, but I'm going to ask anyway. Did people travel to this game from outside the country, or is this local? Well, I did happen to sit next to a couple of Japanese fans, younger folks in their 20s, both of whom were studying English at UC Davis, and they made the trip down from davis um

one was a let me see if i can get this right one was a hunch and tiger supporter gosh i can't remember the team that the other that the girl uh supported back home just make it up they won't know uh must have been the the ham fighters right. I always assume it's the ham fighters. So and there were lots of obviously Japanese nationals in our section. So I'm going to say that that some folks actually traveled. And when I got to AT&T Park, when we first sort of walked up and before we went in the gates, I had to get my Netherlands hat. So I waited at one of the concession stands outside the park. And there were tons and tons and tons of Japanese speaking Japanese nationals who were copying, copying WBC gear. So I'm going to say a lot of people traveled. I couldn't tell you how many or how far, but this seemed to be a destination type event for sure for a large number of people. So you are a known Netherlands supporter.

You're going to go to the game Tuesday night, Monday night, right? Monday night between the Netherlands and the Dominican Republic. I will be there. I'm sporting my my new Netherlands cap. Will you be wearing your sweet aviators again? Absolutely. Why not? All right. All right. So great. This is really playing well to like six people who saw that tweet.

Do you can you give us a sense of like sort of how surprising it is that the Netherlands is in is in the, uh, is in the final, in the semifinals. I can't quite get a read on whether it's downright shocking or just sort of like a seven seed making it into the final four. I think it's, it's probably closer to a 16 than a seven, but, um, I don't know, maybe like an 11, 12 seed. It's not a total shock. They're loaded with talent. They have the aged Andrew Jones, but they also have Andrelton Simmons and some young bucks from Curaçao playing for the Kingdom of the Netherlands.

So it's certainly a surprise, but I wouldn't say it's a total shock. I think that the, whatever surprise the Netherlands may have generated by making it this far is sort of equaled, if not outstripped by Puerto Rico, having made it this far. I don't think anybody saw them coming in and knocking off the,

the two time WBC champ in Japanapan um so handily i mean they made it look almost effortless uh it what proportion of the netherlands team is from the netherlands as opposed to corso i think it's uh i have not looked at the roster and I probably should have done so by this point. I want to say it's probably 80 percent Antillean. I know there's the odd dude like Luke Van Mill, who is with the Angels and I believe now with the Reds, who is actually Netherlands born. But the vast majority of the of the guys, the starting lineup at any rate, are from Curaçao. And is there any, I know that there's sort of a kind of Japanese style of play compared to an American style of play.

Do other countries have styles of play that are notable, or is everybody basically playing the same game? I think Cuba has a distinctive style, and it's sort of the inverse of Japan. They just sort of sit back and try and hit dingers. Fun. Yeah, it was pretty cool. They failed to advance.

Whereas, you know, we know what Japan tries to do. They just sort of put everything in play and try and beat it out. That really was sort of their undoing tonight. Puerto Rico, you know, they could just sort of junk ball them to death and they sort of knew Japan was going to flail and roll over on stuff. And the Puerto Rican pitchers just let the Japanese hitters get themselves out time and time again tonight. I'm trying to think if there is any other specific styles of play.

No, I think Cuba is the one that sort of stands out. There's sort of the Asian style of play because I think Chinese Taipei and Korea are more like Japan than they are like Major League Baseball that we're used to seeing. But it really was just fun watching, uh, the Cuban headers just sort of drop the back shoulder and try and just yank everything. So, uh, so I have a question, uh, uh, sort of about the larger, um, themes of the event. I've

heard, you know, many people talk about how it doesn't really matter how well this plays in the United States, how you shouldn't focus on the ratings or anything like that, because really, this is a big success in other parts of the world. And that's what this is all about. And so I accept that the premise is fine. No problems with that. But I just wonder, how do you feel like it's playing in the United States based on kind of how young it is as a tournament? And does it matter that it's popular here or that it become popular here do you think that's a good question um and i i may not be able to answer it just being too close to it like i've uh whereas you've watched uh zero pitches of the wbc i've watched pretty much every pitch even you know the games that would start to uh 2 and 3 a.m local time i would watch

uh on delays later why so you know 90 plus percent of uh all of the pitches in the wbc and enjoyed it greatly um and one of the things i really found interesting is watching the different styles of play watching um watching the australian players get in the face of the umps uh watching the japanese and uh chinese taipei players flip their bats after they put a ball in play just watching the subtle cultural differences uh of the games um so i don't know that I can really answer how well it's playing here I do think it's important for the broader international future of the game that it does well overseas but I really don't have a clear sense of of how important it is that it that it plays well here for instance AT&T Park was maybe half full tonight. Um, and I understand

that they've already released a bunch of $5 bleacher tickets for tomorrow night's game. So that sort of suggests that, uh, advanced ticket sales have been pretty poor. Um, and I have no sense of, of, uh, of what the TV ratings have been like. That's something that I haven't even looked into yet. But you got to think that this is going to have a profound impact on the future of baseball in the Netherlands, for instance. I mean, maybe an entire generation of kids gets bitten by the baseball bug. And, you know, this is a sort of a watershed moment for baseball in Holland. But who knows? So you've you live in the Bay Area.

You go to games at AT&T all the time. I went to a WBC game just because I happened to be in Arizona where when one was going on. Would you have traveled to this event if you did not live in that area or anywhere near where it was being played are you so into it that you would have gone a considerable distance to see it because it is an event that doesn't happen every year i would i mean if i had the wherewithal to do it i certainly would um on the flip side of that i think one of the reasons I've been so into it, uh, so far in 2013 is that I, I already had my season tickets, uh, and I bought the WBC tickets as a part of the package. So I knew that I was going to go to both semifinals and the finals game. Um,

so I sort of went into my relationship with the classic, uh, knowing I was going to be there. So I've been paying closer attention maybe than I would have normally, but sure. If the classic, uh, knowing I was going to be there. So I've been paying closer attention maybe than I would have normally, but sure. If I was, uh, independently wealthy and didn't have to worry about a day job or something, I would absolutely make this a destination thing just to, cause you know, especially, um, not knowing who's going to get through and who you're going to end up seeing. It's great to be able to see some of these Japanese players that you've been hearing about the Cuban squad. Again, I think it's a, it's kind of a bummer that we didn't get to see them in San Francisco because

it's such a rare opportunity to see them play because of the embargo status and all of that. So I'm weird. I understand it's baseball viewer. So I'm sure you've read some of the proposals or the recommendations. We've we've done some at BP, but just suggestions from various people on how to improve the WBC, how to make it more appealing, particularly to U.S. viewers, I guess. And they seem to be centered on sort of condensing it into maybe a one week or shorter tournament. So it's kind of a March Madness style event, or maybe moving it to a different part of the year,

playing it during the All-Star break. It seems like you're pretty happy with the way things are right now, but what has been your reaction to those proposals? Are there any that kind of catch your eye that you think are particularly good ideas? I'm certainly not opposed to any of the types of things that you're talking about. I thought there were tons of good ideas that came out of the, uh, the BP piece where folks submitted ideas. Um, but again, I think, uh, I think Sam may have hinted at it earlier. It really is a young competition. Um, and we have, you know, it's

going to be sort of a long tail, uh, type event. We're not going to know for, uh, eight or 10, or maybe even 20 years, maybe a generation. We're not going to know for uh eight or ten or maybe even 20 years maybe a generation we're not going to know what its impact has been um so honestly i can't say i mean i think it's we have to sort of take the long view and understand or at least hope that uh it's for the betterment of the game around the world and for the long term rather than for uh oh my god we have to make sure andrew mccutcheon can play next time right there's certainly no side to having uh the u.s born mlb superstars playing uh so anything they can do to to encourage guys to play that's great. I would just hate to neuter it in any way by taking sort of the short view of it, if that makes sense. What's your reaction to sort of the hand-wringing about people who don't

play and the idea that they have some sort of obligation out of patriotism or to their country to play versus, I guess, the opposing side says, well, it's understandable that they don't want to play. They don't have the incentives to play. It makes sense for them to stay in camp and concentrate on their real jobs. Where do you fall on that spectrum? Definitely fall closer to the latter half that you you mentioned um again i think it's good anytime you can get a superstar in there to to draw more eyeballs to it it's great but it's not uh this kind of international competition doesn't uh rise and fall with the participation of a single guy or even you know a half dozen guys of course course, I want to see Matt Kent play baseball

because I want to see Matt Kent play baseball because he's amazing. Um, by the same token, it's great to see, you know, the guys in Venezuela, uh, you know, go out and, and do their thing too. I think a lot of the former view that you expressed, a lot of that is just far too USA centric. And again, we need to take the broad and long view with this thing, or at least that's what I choose to do. I heard, yeah, I mean, I heard all the complaints about how, you know, terrible it is that this player's not playing and that player's not playing. And I expected to look at the roster and see a terrible team. And in fact, it's an incredibly good team that was significantly better on paper than almost all the other teams in the tournament. And so, I mean, it's hard to imagine that it would add all that much to have a few more players. And I don't know.

I mean, I guess if you put together the greatest team of all time, that would be interesting to watch in a sort of a dream team kind of way. But on the other hand, I'm pretty much always rooting against the United States in a tournament like this. And so I'm kind of happy when they don't play. Can you give me a sense? There's three teams left. Of course, Puerto Rico Netherlands Dominican

Republic can you um kind of compare each of those or I guess can you tell me what sort of level of talent each of those teams is like is the Dominican Republic um you know the the you know the 1998 Yankees compared to the Netherlands Rancho rancho cucamonga quakes or is it much closer than that like sort of assign three teams to each of them so i have some perspective on what the talent gap is yeah i think it's um the netherlands are not an advanced A team. I think if you look at their lineup, which we could do if we pulled it up, they look a lot like a big league ball club. Maybe they look like the Astros,

or maybe they look like the Twins or something, present day. But they look essentially like a big league ball club. I mean, they have superstars at a few positions and I've already mentioned Andrelson Simmons and he's really the guy that sticks out. He's been playing great defense up the middle and absolutely crushing the ball all tournament long. Dominican Republic has to be the heavy favorite at this point because they've got MLB regulars at nearly every position. Um, and that sort of, uh, and Puerto Rico is about, I don't know, 50, 50 big league regulars and, uh, journeyman type guys. So, um, maybe I'm being too charitable to the Netherlands and calling them the Astros, but I don't think the talent level is – it's certainly not big league to A-ball.

It might be the majors to AAA, but I wouldn't put it at any more – any further apart than that i guess okay so they're the astros and the dominican republic are they in in one game where pitching depth doesn't matter would they be the best team in baseball or are they just uh you know a first division team i would say a first division team yeah because again they have uh they have mlb regulars at at eight positions or seven starting positions. And then they have one guy who's not currently a big league starter. And then the pitching. And they've got, you know, crazy back end of the bullpen to come in and lock it down. So they've shortened the game. If the Netherlands, you know, is trailing after six and certainly after seven,

I would prepare to stick a fork in them. Okay. And if I can, Ben, do you mind if I ask a final question? I do not. All right. So baseball is not a sport that is supposed to do well in one-and-done kind of situations because we know that one game doesn't tell you anything about baseball talent. about baseball talent. And it's kind of one of the things that is missing from baseball

that makes some other sports really incredibly exciting at various points in the year. Do you, you went to a one and done game today. Do you think it works? Is there any sort of sense that the whole thing is a farce for that reason? Or is it just pure frigging excitement?

It was pretty cool. I found, even though going into the game, I said I was going to root for Puerto Rico because they were the underdog or I considered them the underdog. I found myself in the late innings, you know, chanting along with the Japanese folks in my section, mostly because I wanted a close game. But yeah, I mean, Um, uh, but yeah, I mean, it's really hard to say. People say that, um, even, even the playoffs and, uh, winning, what do you got to win 11 games to win the world series? Um, yeah. People even say, you know, that's an unfair, uh, uh, representation of, you know, what a team really is. and you might call the 2010 Giants a perfect

example of that uh so while I wouldn't call it a farce it certainly is uh yeah as you point out not something that we're used to seeing in baseball and uh it can be frustrating if you're on the wrong end of it that's that's for damn sure sure. Good or bad as a setup for this? I'm going to say good. Why not? We have to be adaptable and flexible, I guess. Perfect. Ian, have fun tonight.

Have fun at the next game. We'll talk to you another time. Appreciate you coming on sure guys thanks for having me please let let sam know how it all turns out i certainly will send me a send me a text uh all right so we'll be back tomorrow with episode 162 uh and have a nice day and send us questions for the wednesday email show at podcast at baseball perspectives oh man i said we're done now we're done all right