The rain that's soaked the World Baseball Challenge this week finally won out Thursday night at Citizen Field.
Score one victory for Mother Nature, whose refusal to let up its shower activity washed out the evening game between Team Canada and Chinese Taipei.
The game was cancelled and won't be replayed because regardless of the outcome it would not have affected the final round-robin standings. Canada (2-2) would have needed to win by a huge margin to finish higher in the standings than either Chinese Taipei (3-1) or Toshiba Japan (3-2). After head-to-head records, the next tiebreaker is the team's number of runs against per inning and Canada would have lost that battle, based on the fact it suffered lopsided losses to Cuba and Japan.
As expected, top-ranked Cuba had no trouble defeating the Bahamas, hammering their island neighbours by a 24-2 count, to finish atop the standings at 5-0. Alexander Ayala went 5-for-6 and had four RBI, while Yosvani Alarcon drove in four runs on three hits. Robelio Carrillo pitched a complete game two-hitter. Cuban outfielder Alfredo Despaigne had two home runs, while Alarcon, Ayala, Jose Dariel Abreu and Rudy Reyes also cleared the wall. Ahmad Williams took the loss for the Bahamas, lasting two innings. Patrick Ali Knowles hit a single shot.
The Bahamas (1-4) finished fifth and will take on fourth-place Canada at noon in the first of three games today at Citizen Field. The 3 p.m. game will feature third-ranked Toshiba-Japan taking on the sixth-place Beijing Tigers (0-5). Cuba will play Chinese Taipei tonight at 7 p.m. with the winner advancing directly to Sunday's 3 p.m. final.
Canada has to win today, then defeat the Japan-Beijing winner Saturday at 11 a.m. for the right to play in the semifinal Saturday night against the loser of the Cuba-Chinese Taipei game.
All tickets for Thursday's evening game are good for any of the remaining WBC games with the exception of the championship game on Sunday.
The weather has played havoc with the schedule and WBC organizers are hoping for a break this weekend.
"We've had some rain for 17 straight days," said WBC co-chair Jim Swanson. "This field has been kept on life support only because of a skilled grounds crew."
