AMERICA! F*CK YEAH!

If I knew how to Photoshop properly, I would replace the puppets with Roger Clemens, Derek Lee, Ken Griffey Jr, and Alex Rodriguez. And yes, I'd make A-Rod one of the female puppets.

Team USA advanced to the 2nd round of the World Baseball Classic with a 17-0 slaughter of South Africa. I'm not surprised and so I'm not really celebrating too much. If you ask me, we shouldn't have had to win this game in order to advance. Losing to Canada was inexcusable.

It gets much harder for the United States. They are in Pool 1 of the 2nd round with Mexico, Japan, and South Korea. Both Japan and South Korea should be well rested. Second round play begins on Monday. The first game for the US: Japan. The two teams with the best record in the 2nd round will play each other a 2nd time with the winner of that game advancing to the finals to play the winner of Group 2.

I think so far this thing has been a success. No players have gotten hurt, and there have been some really amazing games and performances. What surprises me was the way the weaker teams played. Teams like Australia, South Africa, and Panama were long shots to advance but they played very well considering the disadvantage in talent they have.

How bout this for a story, Shairon Martis of the Netherlands and a prospect in the Giants farm system threw a 7 inning no hitter against Panama. The Netherlands put up 10 runs so the game ended early via the slaughter rule. Martis was right on the edge of the pitch count limit for the 1st round, throwing 65 total pitches and allowing only 2 base runners.