OK, raise your hand if you had the Dutch making the final eight, let alone the final four.

-- MWE

Well, they made the final eight last time, so why not again. But final four? No.

Rough month for the Castros. First Hugo Chavez, now this.

Nice to see Schoop having a good tournament. The Orioles could use him at 2B if (when) Brian Roberts goes down.

Most Dutch people I know don't even know that they play baseball, let alone that they're this good.

Most Dutch people I know don't even know that they play baseball, let alone that they're this good.

This.

Our company HQ is Dutch-based and for the past couple of weeks, I have been desperately trying to stoke interest among.... had to rap some knuckles this morning for no one on a call even knowing they they'd made it into the finals!

Isn't baseball in the Netherlands a regional thing? I had a friend from Limburg who played youth baseball, but it doesn't seem to be popular or even known everywhere.

Limburg?

Is your friend portly, and possessing a remarkable sense of taste?

It's a Randstad (Amsterdam, Haarlem, Rotterdam, The Hague, Utrecht) thing normally, most of the towns near where my aunt lives in South Holland have clubs and all of the Hoofdklasse clubs come from the Randstad. I watched the World Port Tournament highlights on TV when I was there a few years ago and it was covered in the newspapers. Baseball has a long history there and obviously the Antillean community there has deep roots in the game. I saw a few folks in Andruw Jones t-shirts and unlike the UK you know it wasn't some present their friends bought them in America. Johan Cruyff and Marco van Basten, among others, played baseball as kids.

To me it's like rugby in America but with deeper roots. I'm sure a lot of Americans have no idea that Americans play rugby, but we have qualified for every World Cup plus one, sent players into the European professional game and we have more rugby players than any other country in the world except for England and Japan (I bet a lot of people didn't know that either). But baseball's been played for much longer in Holland and clubs own or have leases on their own fields with real dirt diamonds, fences, dugouts and batting cages, which is rather rare in US rugby.

That was then, now the Honkballers fifteen minutes of fame at home have started.

Way to go, Netherlands!

Boxscore makes it look like a pretty dynamite game - three two-run leads blown, the last one in the eighth, followed by the walkoff run in the ninth.

"Stunt Honkballers" is the greatest headline in the history of headlines.

12 - it was a sensational game. Not only the back and forth but the Cubans had a man at third with one out in the ninth and two of their best hitters up but a strikeout and a fly out ended the threat.

I can understand that some people aren't interested in the tournament but if you like baseball this has been very exciting. Today's game was just another in a line of exciting games.

I really expected them to split their two games with Cuba.

Most Dutch people I know don't even know that they play baseball, let alone that they're this good.

Well, they aren't this good or relevant in the Netherlands -- where I assume zonk's company is located. I know there is that Honkbal league there, but only 2 of the 15 players who played for the Netherlands in this game were born in Holland (most of them are from Curacao). I'm not totally sure what the relationship is between the territory and its owner, but at several thousand miles away I'm assuming that there's some lack of identification (if there were a sport that was huge in Guam but not played in the mainland US, how many of us would have it remotely on our radar?).

Johan Cruyff and Marco van Basten, among others, played baseball as kids.

There's a book out there by Josh Chetwynd that looks at baseball in European countries, and this was relatively common in Europe until the 1970s when soccer became more of a year-round event. Before then it was common for soccer teams to have their players do at least some recreational baseball to keep them fit. But once the clubs started dropping (or decreasing their involvement with) baseball teams, really only the Dutch and Italians (and to a lesser degree the Spanish) kept playing on a high level. Cruyff apparently is a pretty big baseball fan to this day and has attended Dutch national team games in the past.

Also, proving that some things are the same all over, I google translated some of the comments on the place Chef linked to... and many of the comments were complaints over how hard it was to find the channels showing it.

This videoexplaining the differences between Holland, The Netherlands, and the Kingdom of the Netherlands is very good.

Inspiring my first ever post-upgrade handle change

Nice. That article has 96 reacties.

How many of them are from right wing ######## complaining that Antilleans aren't real Dutchmen. (Or are not all newspaper comment sections like America's?)

I was under the impression that That Curacao and Aruba are less like Guam and more like Hawaii. A far off place that really is part of the country. I admit to total ignorance, however.

Yes, I also translated some of the comments. Lots of people complaining about endless stultifying coverage of Robben's blisters and cycling.

Who needs Google Translate? Dutch is just a weirdly spelled mix of English, Swedish and German, perfectly understandable. :-)

Just imagine if Canada had beaten the US - you'd be down the two countries who, pre the first tournament, were viewed as favorites for the finals. Gotta say I never thought the WBC would be so competitive. I figured if the US lost the first one that pride would force almost every US player to want to be there. Instead they were 2 innings from being sent to qualifying. Now Cuba has hit roadbumps, losing 2 games to the Netherlands.

Now for total Bizzarro World we just need Italy and the Netherlands to meet in the final. Although right now I am cheering the Dominican Republic.

I was under the impression that That Curacao and Aruba are less like Guam and more like Hawaii. A far off place that really is part of the country. I admit to total ignorance, however.

More like Guam, I think.

There are three autonomously governed Caribbean localities that are part of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, namely, Aruba, Curacao, and Sint Maarten (the last is part of the island of St. Martin, sharing space with St. Martin, which is part of France. So France and the Netherlands share a border, just not in Europe). Each of those uses its own currency and is considered a unitary state that is part of the larger kingdom.

There are also three municipalities on other islands, Bonaire, Sint Eustatius, and Saba. These are considered part of the continental Netherlands, although they use the US dollar as their currency and are not part of any of the twelve provinces in the European Netherlands. Essentially they're like Washington D.C. They'd be more like Hawaii than Guam.

"Perhaps the most beautiful sports in recent years. Everything was in it. Tension, pure class and despite injuries and a terrible game in the legs an absolute winner mentality. look what we can jointly reach"

"This was enjoyed. Four hours sport and giga voltage. Baseball is simply THE sport. Where is the CSS??? If it's not skating, football or hockey is not giving them home. On to SF men. Success there."

Before then it was common for soccer teams to have their players do at least some recreational baseball to keep them fit.

The idea of soccer players retaining any semblance of fitness by playing baseball is hilarious. I guess it's better than bowling or golf.

Giga voltage indeed.

More like Guam, I think.

Tim Duncan played for USA Basketball despite being a US Virgin Islander.

Way to go Honkballers. An analogy is swiftly developing -- Gonzaga : NCAA March Madness :: Honkballers : WBC.

In other words, they're perennially underestimated and underrated, but if this keeps up people are just going to start expecting them to be good each time out.

By the way -- and this is an embarrassing question to ask -- but are there any legal (or, *ahem*...questionable) ways to watch the WBC online for someone without a TV?

I did not know Andruw Jones was Dutch!

The idea of soccer players retaining any semblance of fitness by playing baseball is hilarious. I guess it's better than bowling or golf.

Wouldn't want their arms to waste away to nubs.

It'll be very hard for the Americas pool to match the insane level of drama that was the Japan pool , Taiwan vs Japan and Cuba vs Neterhland were 2 games that looked and felt like Game 7 WS and then some.

Can you imagine in 4 years when the oldest infielder will be Simmons at the ripe age of 27?

If profar replaces de caster, where do you play him? Ideally, schoop at third and profar at second - right?

I did not know Andruw Jones was Dutch!

By virtue of Curacao being under the Dutch crown still, technically.

I guess then they could make a team out of Canada + Aussie + all the other teams still technically owning allegiance to the UK? not sure if that team would be any better than team Canada though.

Haddadi update: broken his single game scoring high - has 13 pts and 8 reb in 18 min so far tonight...

wrong thread? D K?

Haddadi is like the slowest center I've ever seen though, but he seem to have a decent idea of what he's doing .

I guess then they could make a team out of Canada + Aussie + all the other teams still technically owning allegiance to the UK? not sure if that team would be any better than team Canada though.

More like the United Kingdom than the Commonwealth, I think, since the Kingdom can negotiate treaties and regulate foreign shipping though Curacao still gets to ratify, and people born in Curacao are citizens of the Kingdom.