A Quiet Bus Is Not A Fun Bus

We had a quiet bus on the way home from the Italy game yesterday. I've been fortunate in my four years at USA Baseball to have only been on board five quiet bus rides out of a possible 48. Besides two championship game losses to Cuba my first two years at the helm of the 16U program, this one was the most disappointing. Italy was a team we should not have lost to, and we all know it, but it happened yesterday and that makes tonight's game against Japan that much more important.
Things just didn't go well yesterday from the outset. The laundry was late and the bus driver got lost on the way to the stadium. None of that affected the way the team prepared or played, but for me it just had a not so great feeling. On a personal note, I reunited with a college friend during our batting practice when I had a chance to meet with Italian outfielder Gino Lollio. Gino is from Florida and he played ball at the University of Michigan while I was there, and it is great to see him getting to continue playing professionally in Italy and representing his heritage along with a number of other non-Italian born players on their national team. Although he didn't play yesterday, I don't feel as good about wishing him good luck before yesterday's game after the fact.

We played a little sloppy yesterday, and to their credit, Italy capitalized on our mistakes every time. They didn't hit too many balls very hard, but they hit them in the right spots and that's what counts. We got down a couple of times and our guys were all trying to do a little too much to get us back in the game. We'd been playing in the big stadium for our first two games where the wind was screaming in from left, and now we found ourselves in the smaller, college stadium where the wind was howling just as hard out of the stadium. I think our eyes got a little big against some underwhelming Italian arms (velocitywise), but they kept us offbalance and all twenty or so pitchers it seemed they used continually got our bats to make outs. We did have the tying run at the plate in the ninth, which was good to see, but in the end Italy beat us and that's hard to take.

I think the team feels the same way about the loss and hopefully it reinforces to them that just about anyone can get you in international play so there's not really ever a good time to play the game below your capabilities. That being said, we still have the opportunity to win our pool which is the goal in these first seven games, but we have to beat Japan tonight keep that within sight. They need the game just as much as we do after a loss last night to Taiwan. The game tonight will no doubt be a tough battle of two perennial baseball powers fighting to keep a second blemish off their record, but I like our chances of getting on a post-game bus filled with the sounds of victory, while Japan rides back to the Howard Prince Hotel in silence.