Israel Stumbles After Dream Run In Baseball Classic
Image by Getty Images
Didi Gregorius homered and drove in five runs as the Netherlands crushed Israel 12-2 in Tokyo to move closer to a semi-final spot.
The win left the Netherlands with a 1-1 record in second-round play, behind Pool E leaders Japan, who won their opening game.
The loss was the first of the tournament for Israel, who dipped to 1-1 and play Japan in their Pool E finale while the Netherlands take on winless Cuba.
Only the top two teams in the pool advance.
Jair Jurrjens, who pitched in Major League Baseball for eight seasons, gave the Netherlands six solid innings of work, limiting Israel to one run on five hits.
Dutch bats, meanwhile, pounded Israel pitching for 15 hits with Andrelton Simmons, Wladimir Balentien and Yurendell de Caster each collecting three.
But it was Gregorius who did much of the damage, the New York Yankees shortstop keying a four-run fourth inning with a three-run blast into the Tokyo Dome’s right field seats.
A message from our CEO & publisher Rachel Fishman Feddersen
I hope you appreciated this article. Before you move on, I wanted to ask you to support the Forward’s award-winning journalism during our High Holiday Monthly Donor Drive.
If you’ve turned to the Forward in the past 12 months to better understand the world around you, we hope you will support us with a gift now. Your support has a direct impact, giving us the resources we need to report from Israel and around the U.S., across college campuses, and wherever there is news of importance to American Jews.
Make a monthly or one-time gift and support Jewish journalism throughout 5785. The first six months of your monthly gift will be matched for twice the investment in independent Jewish journalism.
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
