Team USA Stumbles From Top to Bottom

LOS ANGELES -- Davey Johnson spent the past week eloquently explaining how desperately he wanted Team USA to win the World Baseball Classic, figuring a title would sooth America's sense of entitlement over the sport and silence some of the tournament's grumbling naysayers.

So how to explain Johnson's head-scratching managerial moves Sunday night, decisions that led to Japan beating the U.S., 9-4, in an elimination semifinal game? Why did Johnson keep starter Roy Oswalt in for a brutal pounding even after it became clear the Japanese had his number? Has the bumbling Adam Dunn mastered the vagaries of Dodger Stadium's right field yet? And any regrets over starting Captain America at shortstop, leaving Jimmy Rollins to DH?

Yikes. This wasn't a very important international contest against the defending WBC champions, with America's presumed dominance of baseball at stake; this was a bad imitation of someone tinkering with strategy and lineups in a Cactus League game.

"Some of our pitchers aren't as far along as some of the Japanese pitchers," said Johnson, as Team USA packed its bags and headed back to spring training camps, while the Japanese advanced to Monday's title game against fierce rival Korea. "When I was in Japan, spring training started January 1. It's a lot of practice. It does give them a head start when you play them in March, but I thought our guys played well."

An all-Asia final is perfectly acceptable for the powers who push the WBC. Millions of viewers from Tokyo to Seoul are expected to tune into a game that will highlight two teams that place collective goals over individual pursuits. Many viewers will purchase baseball paraphernalia, many more will fall in love with the sport. That's the WBC's long-range goal, and if it inconveniences MLB teams on these shores, if it irritates American fans and media, too bad. Bud Selig has made it clear the WBC, with few revisions, plans to expand in 2013, to model itself after soccer's lucrative and entrancing World Cup.

That's all good and fine, but wouldn't it behoove the U.S. to jump fully on board? Johnson was handcuffed from the beginning, first by American players disinterested in playing and MLB teams wary of cooperating, and later by unwritten rules that backed him into dilemmas and decisions that consistently backfired.

Japan's five-run fourth inning off Oswalt offered a blunt example, with recent history gathering like warning clouds around the pitching mound. Major league pitchers who played in the WBC in 2006 either got injured or saw their ERAs balloon once the MLB season began. It's a statistic Johnson kept in his frontal lobe, one that dictated how carefully he had to maneuver arms and egos.

Japan faced the same issue Sunday, but on a much smaller level. Starter Daisuke Matsuzaka's full-time gig might be with Boston, but the Red Sox should have no quarrel with how he was handled across 4 2/3 effective innings. Dice-K made one costly mistake, a fastball down the pipe on just the second pitch of the game that Brian Roberts crushed for a home run, inspiring shouts of "USA! USA!" from the crowd of 43,630.

The euphoria was short lived on this chilly, windy night, at least among the Americans rocking Dodger Stadium. On a field damp from earlier rain, Roberts' critical error keyed Team USA's awful fourth inning, which began with Japan's Atsunori Inaba lead-off single slipping past the glove of the second baseman. Michihiro Ogasawara singled to center field, followed by Kosuke Fukudome hitting into what should have been a double-play ground ball that Roberts muffed, knotting the score, 2-2. Still not much signs of life in the American bullpen, but fear not, MLB managers: there's plenty of time for relievers to get their work in before Opening Day.

Johnson left Oswalt in as the Japanese batted around, teasing the right side of the American defense in particular. A sacrifice fly by Kenji Johjima, a triple from Akinori Iwamura that flummoxed Dunn in right field, an RBI single by Munenori Kawasaki and an RBI double by Hiroyuki Nakajima, on a 3-0 pitch -- finally, Oswalt was done, leaving with Japan up, 6-2.

"I thought he was throwing the ball alright," Johnson said of Oswalt, who lasted just 3 2/3 innings, allowing six runs (four earned) on six hits. "I tried to get (John) Grabow up. I didn't think it was going to take him so long. It took him longer in the cold weather to get loose. But I still thought he [Oswalt] was throwing good enough to stay in the ballgame."

Johnson was correct to hold back Jake Peavy for the possible championship game and instead start Oswalt, a big-game pitcher who cherishes the buzz from international competition. He was part of the 2000 Olympic gold-medal winning team in Sydney, and 1-0 in two WBC starts before Sunday's battering, when his manager kept him out there three batters too many.


Johnson also can't be faulted for a risky, emergency move that forced Mark DeRosa, a middle infielder, to man first base. Wearing a glove that had been sent via FedEx from the Cleveland Indians, DeRosa twisted into a few awkward contortions at first, but he also proved to be an offensive catalyst. He turned on Takahiro Mahara's fastball in the eighth inning, ripping it down the left-field line and scoring two runs, and once again Dodger Stadium shook with chants of "USA!"

Japanese fans dressed in Samurai costume hung their heads and lowered their red-and-white flags. Legendary Japanese hitter Sadaharu Oh, sitting in a field box, bowed, as if in prayer. Then Johnson decided to give Evan Longoria, just up from the Grapefruit League, a turn at-bat. The pinch hitter struck out, Roberts grounded feebly back to the mound and Oh never stopped grinning.

Johnson bristled before and after the game when reporters questioned why Derek Jeter, aka Captain America, got the start at shortstop. Jeter's two-out throwing error that flew past a stretching DeRosa enabled Japan to tack on three runs in the bottom of the eighth. While the inning wasn't as maddening as the fourth, it did have its share of what-was-that moments. Dunn lost a run-scoring double in the right field lights, Johnson went with reliever Joel Hanrahan before Scot Shields ... but most of the debate revolved around Jeter.

"Derek is the captain. I want him out there," Johnson said before the game. "Jimmy is going to DH. They're both going to get, hopefully, four or five at-bats. So that wasn't really a big decision."

Jeter went 1-for-5, Jimmy Rollins was 4-for-4 with a walk. There was a brief glimpse into the force Team USA could be during the third inning, when Rollins drove a two-out slider off Dice-K to right field, stole second, and scored on David Wright's two-strike double to deep right center.

"A three-week truce," Wright had called his pairing with arch-rival Rollins, a peculiar match of Met and Phillie teaming up for a greater good. That's the purest definition of the WBC, one the Asian teams can fully embrace because the tournament falls when they're out of season. Team USA plays under different restraints, different rules, different expectations.

If all things were equal, there would be plenty of teeth-grinding amongst the Japanese after Yu Darvish, the lanky pitcher being held back for an anticipated start Monday, was summoned to close out the Americans Sunday. Catastrophe was avoided, the Samurai honored, as Darvish breezed through the inning and got Dunn looking at a fastball down the gut for the final out.

The Japanese were subdued in their celebration, reserving emotion and energy for super rivals Korea. On the other side,Team USA's disappointment was muted, for their real seasons haven't even begun.

"We made it to the Final Four at least," Rollins said as he left Dodger Stadium. "But that's probably not good enough, considering what could have been."