The World Baseball Classic continued over the weekend and it was all kinds of fun, with the exception of watching the US get absolutely embarrassed and blown out on Sunday night. But hey, maybe you enjoyed that and that’s ok. The Cincinnati Reds had several players get some game action over the weekend and some of them played quite well for their respective teams.
On Saturday Colombia and Mexico played in a classic, with Colombia coming out on top 5-4 in 10 innings. The game featured three Cincinnati pitchers getting work in the game. Luis Cessa came out of the bullpen for Mexico and pitched 2.0 innings, allowing one run on two hits and he picked up a strikeout.
On the other side both Reiver Sanmartin and Pedro Garcia pitched for Colombia. Sanmartin began the 7th inning and was charged with a run on two hits in 0.1 innings, but he exited the game without a run scoring against him. Two runners were on when Colombia turned to Garcia. He came out and got Randy Arozarena to fly out, but a ground ball found it’s way through the middle of the infield with two outs to bring in the game tying run. Garcia got a fly out to end the inning. He returned to the mound for the 8th and retired Mexico in order.
All of the games are being played with pitch tracking taking place. That meant we got the first look at Pedro Garcia pitch data since May of 2021 when he was in the Florida State League. The difference from May of 2021 to March of 2023 is quite different. In the single game he pitched with pitch tracking he averaged 91.3 MPH with his fastball and 77.7 MPH with his slider. Over the weekend he averaged 95.5 MPH with his fastball and his slider was at 86.5 MPH.
Sunday was a big matchup between Venezuela and Puerto Rico. Venezuela jumped out to a 7-0 lead and never looked back, holding on for a 9-6 victory. Henry Ramos pinch hit in the game, going 0-1. Three Reds pitchers took the mound in the game. Silvino Bracho picked up the save for Venezuela, throwing 2.0 perfect innings in the game. Fernando Cruz allowed a solo home run in an inning of work for Puerto Rico. Alexis Diaz threw a hitless inning, giving up a walk and striking out three batters.
Steven Leyton is one of the few position players from the Reds in the World Baseball Classic. He played in both games for Nicaragua over the weekend. He went 0-4 on Saturday against Puerto Rico. On Sunday against Israel he doubled and drove in the only run that Nicaragua scored on the day. It put his country ahead 1-0 and it’s a lead that they held until the bottom of the 8th when Israel scored three runs to take the lead for good.
It was a tough day for Great Britain on Sunday against Canada. Despite grabbing a 3-0 lead in the 1st inning, Great Britain wound up being run-ruled in an 18-8 loss that was over in the 7th inning. Like many of the pitchers for Great Britain on the day, it was a tough one for Donovan Benoit. He allowed three hits and walked three batters without recording an out and was charged with four earned runs. On the bright side of things – Benoit hit 98 MPH in the game multiple times.