Team Venezuela won its first World Baseball Classic championship on Tuesday night, shocking the baseball world with a 3-2 win over Team USA. Venezuela beat the reigning champions in Team Japan to open bracket play, then ended Italy’s Cinderella story en route to the championship game.
Team USA had an easier path out of pool play on paper, but a possible strategic blunder by manager Mark DeRosa took destiny out of their hands. As such, they had to wait to see what happened between Italy and Mexico in hopes of advancing based on specific tiebreaker rules.