It's WBC time. Here's my newsletter and my Japan-centric view of things.
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11.03.2026 14:15
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It's WBC time. Here's my newsletter and my Japan-centric view of things.
mailchi.mp/3d60332120d3...
Being neurodivergent, I get it. But one would think the Team USA staff would have someone willing to check the facts BEFORE everyone partied until the early morning hours.
Having already scheduled a White House visit for Team USA after their World Baseball Classic championship next week, unknown sources revealed that the United States is now planning to bomb Italy until its baseball federation agrees to a replay of its Pool B game with the U.S.
One day I will be able to see an interview with the CEO of my previous employer and not be furious about the damage he did to my life despite the fact that he never bothered to learn what I did for the company, but today is not that day
What this story leaves out, sadly, is that prison doctors replaced the man’s peg leg with a modern prosthetic, but his parrot died while in incarceration.
Manager Hirokazu Ibata's determination to play to his team's strengths rather than conform to dogma is a huge leap for Japan.
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LOL
Samurai Japan players are rightly wearing T-shirts saying "March is our time." And no thanks to NPB, March is my time at Japanese ballparks, too.
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Tokyo Dome tradition: The futile effort by stadium staff to lift the park off the ground by flapping their arms.
The intensity and passion in the WBC still challenges some peoples' baseball belief system.
They'll get over it, or they won't, but for the rest of us, this is something spectacular.
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Masataka Yoshida is back in his element, driving in runs with a flourish as Japan clinches the top spot in WBC Pool C.
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With Taiwan's win over South Korea, Japan has clinched a WBC quarterfinal spot in Miami. Should Samurai Japan lose to both Australia and Czechia and finish in a tie with South Korea and Taiwan, Japan advances by virtue of having beaten both those teams.
Taiwan and South Korea put on another show as World Baseball Classic Pool C reaches the boiling point.
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Ouch
Many thanks!
If Lee Jeong Beom was "the son of the wind,"
and his son, Lee Jung Hoo is "the grandson of the wind,"
is grandpa Lynyrd Skynyrd?
Japan and Korea resume their storied rivalry in thunder-struck clash
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According to Sadaharu Oh, the WBC offers players something bigger than themselves.
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25 years ago, when my spoken Japanese was barely intelligible, I feared interrupting players and coaches on the field, until Sadaharu Oh turned and asked me if I wanted to ask him something.
“Your Japanese is a lot better than it was then,” he said Saturday.
The Apartment.
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#shohei_ohtani, #unicorn, #WBC, #Samurai_Japan
Can he at least swing the bat with both hands and make it look like he's trying
Being “a triple shy of a cycle” is the dumbest reference to baseball’s dumbest stat, except when it comes to a guy who regularly hits triples.
Use it for Shohei Ohtani and I won’t bitch for once.
I love having Masataka Yoshida playing baseball in Japan again
Grand slam for Ohtani and Japan leads Taiwan 4-0
No country has been able to match Japan's World Baseball Classic success, but once upon a time, no tournament could take place without NPB and its players throwing a wobbly.
How Japan got from there to here:
jballallen.com/japans-journ...
Getting the band back together.
“It’s absolutely important to not change, and also absolutely important to change.”
—Yoshinobu Yamamoto on dealing with new circumstances.
Another baseball season and a reunion with Ken Watanabe at Tokyo Dome
Starring in Tokyo…
