Last night, Manny Machado got a taste of his own medicine.
After not once, but twice making astonishing defensive plays in the field during the World Baseball Classic tournament, Machado was robbed of a game-changing home run to right-center field in the bottom of the seventh inning by Adam Jones.
Or, at least, that’s the tame way to describe this insanity:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8zw182AEIAM
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The catch kept the score at 4-2, which became significant once Robinson Cano hit a home run during the very next at-bat – a home run that would’ve otherwise tied the game.
Here’s what Jones had to say of the catch (via Ken Rosenthal, Fox Sports):
“I’m still kind of in shock that I even got to that ball,” he said. “I mean, off the bat I’m just like, ‘This ball’s hit really far, so just keep going, keep going.’ You know this California air’s going to slow it down, and you just never quit.
“That’s just the style I play with. I don’t mind running into a wall or two.”
For his part, Machado seemed to respect his Orioles’ teammate’s effort:
But that’s not all that happened during last night’s ridiculous USA victory.
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Because earlier in the game, someone had to give team USA that 4-2 lead and that man, naturally, was Giancarlo Stanton.
Stanton took the first pitch of his at-bat out to left field in about a quarter of a second. Seriously, this guys’ power knows no bounds:
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According to Statcast, that Stanton blast came off the bat at a ridiculous 117.3 MPH – that would be the fourth hardest hit home run in the StatCast era! And thanks to a 20 degree launch angle, it stayed in the air for just 4.8 seconds and traveled 424 feet.
Giancarlo! 💪
— Baseball is Fun (@flippingbats) March 19, 2017
Of course, thanks to Jones’ catch later in the game, that was all the runs Team USA would need.
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Team USA will now head to the semi-finals, where they’ll take on Team Japan at Dodger Stadium this Tuesday. It’ll be just the second time (out of four) that they’ve made it this far. Hopefully, this can be the year they take it all the way.
That way we can see a little more of this:
Oh. My. God. 😱 pic.twitter.com/yXebLbYNu3
— Baseball is Fun (@flippingbats) March 19, 2017
And do a little more of this:
.@TylerClippard is all of us right now. #WBC2017 pic.twitter.com/JcvN1j9Nrq
— WBC Baseball (@WBCBaseball) March 19, 2017
World Baseball Classic, man …. who knew?
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