by Lewis Rubman

MEXICALI BC, MEXICO–Both starting pitchers, Nicaragua’s Fidencio Flores and Mexico’s Daniel Rodriquez, had to dig themselves out of trouble in the first two innings, giving rise to hopes that tonight’s match up would not be a repeat of Friday night’s seven inning, 11-0 massacre by the Mexican nine.  The hosts had runners on second and third with one out in the first, but Flores wiggled out of the hole he was in by striking out Jesse Castillo and Augstin Murillo.  Nicaragua loaded the bases with one out in the top of the second, but Rodríguez struck out Dwight Britton and got Omar Obregón to ground out to third to end the inning.

With one down in the Mexican second, Obregon’s game and Flores’s success came to an end. A hard-hit ground ball hit Nicaragua’s shortstop in the leg and caused him to leave the game.  After that, there was no stopping the Mexicans.

They scored six times in the second, beginning with a single to center by Esteban Quiroz,  another on a bases-loaded walk to Jesús Castillo, and three more on a bases-clearing double by Murillo.

The Mexicans doubled their lead in the fifth, when they sent eleven batters to the plate. Leo Heras homered to right, plating Murillo.  After Dwight Britton dropped a fly ball by Xorge Carillo in centerfield, Nicaragua’s manager, Marvin Benard, brought Carlos  Teller in to staunch the flow by retiring Mejia and Walter Ibarra.  The hemorage resumed when Elizalde singled and Quiroz brought him home with a four-bagger.  That made the score 11-0, a mirror-image of Mexico’s humiliation of Nicaragua two days earlier.

A single by Humberto Sosa off of Jose Villega brought Jose Aguilar home with Mexico’s final tally.

In the top of the seventh, Nicaragua made a last-gasp attempt to, not win, not even to tie, their opponents,  but to prolong the game by lessening Mexico’s  lead to less than the ten  runs that would have  triggered the mercy rule.  Elmer Reyes’s double to right drove in Britton with the one run Nicaragua managed to score in its fourteen innings against Mexicao’s pitching.

Mexico’s attack was led by Sebastian Elizalde (two for three  and an RBI), Esteban Quiroz (two for four, with four RBIs), Andrian Gonzalez (two for three),  Augustin Murillo (one for two, with three driven in), and Leo Heras (one for three, also with three batted in).

Daniel Rodríguez, the winning pitcher, Carlos Bustamante, Javier Solano, and the Nationals’ Oliver Perez combined to keep Nicaragua off the board.  Arturo Barradas was charged with the only run scored against the Mexican staff.

There seems little point in detailing the miseries of the Nicaraguan pitching corps.  It should be enough to note that  Flores was charged with the loss.

Mexico joins Colombia, who won the qualifying round being played in Panama City by defeating the Panamanians 2-1, as participants in the quarter finals.  The remaining berth for the sixteen-team field will be filled when Great Britain,  Brazil, Pakistan, and Israel fight it out on Coney Island from September 22 through the 25th.  The other dozen teams to compete in the quarter finals, chosen based on their performance in the 2013 Classic are Japan, China Taipei, South Korea, China, Netherlands, Italy, the United States, Puerto Rico, Cuba, Venezuela, and Canada.  The times and locations of the quarter-final, semi-final, and final games have not yet been announced.