Before this game started, Benji Gil, the Mexican manager, was told that something new had to happen today in their game. Either Mexico would either win their first game in the tournament for the first time ever or Team GB would beat Mexico in a baseball tournament for the first time ever. In the end, it proved to be the first of the two.
Like the group games in Phoenix, Arizona, last time around, these games for Mexico are home games in all but actuality. The support was massive, with an official attendance just below 30 K. I can reliably inform you that probably 95%, if not more, were supporting Mexico, with a smattering of GB fans and the rest being neutral.
The national anthems played, and ZZ blurted out of the stadium speakers. Jack Anderson took the mound for Team GB. It died down, and this contest kicked off.
Anderson started with a swinging strike on the first pitch to Jarren Duran, and he got him swinging two more times to strike Duran out. The first battle went to Team GB, and the dominance on defence and pitchers on both sides started.
Arozarena grounded out on the first pitch, and GB were through 2 batters in just 6 pitches, which was phenomenal, especially in this format. But Aranda stepped up to the plate and didn’t swing at the first 5 pitches. With the 6th, he knocked a single between B.J. Murray and Jazz Chisholm Jr.
That brought the icon Alejandro Kirk to the plate, and after fouling off the first pitches, he took two pitches before flying out to Trayce Thompson in right field. The Mexican fans made noise, but the lofty launch angle meant it wasn’t destined to go beyond the fence.
Skirmish one to GB.
Jazz led off with an almighty hack but took 4 pitches and found himself in a full count. An easy pop-up into shallow centre was caught. That brought up Nate Eaton, who had peppered the outfield seats in BP, but he also hit a weak pop, which was routinely taken by the Mexican defence.
Harry stepped up to the plate with the hopes of kick-starting this GB tournament, and he did that. A flare single to RF, which gave Murray a chance to shine. He produced a monster hack on the first before hitting a line drive single to RF, advancing Harry to third.
Up stepped Matt Koperniak, the unlucky man of the 2023 team. So, many hard hits turned into outs and in 2026, his luck didn’t change. A routine flyout to LF meant GB didn’t manage to score one, but definitely made Mexico take note.
Skirmish two to Mexico
Rowdy Tellez led off the second for Mexico. He fouled off a ball and worked himself into a full count after seven pitches. He grounded out, but a nine-pitch AB is a small win in pitch-count-limited baseball.
Nacho Alvarez Jr. stepped up next, and with Anderson’s fastball sitting in the low 90s, he was punished for a fastball down the middle. Nacho took it yard and gave Mexico the lead.
Nick Gonzales and Alek Thomas both were out in quick fashion, but Mexico had taken the lead 1-0
Skirmish three to Mexico
Kristian Robinson, making his debut for GB, started off the second when he struck out looking on a pitch, which he might have challenged if he had the ability to do so. But that isn’t part of this tournament.
Ivan Johnson popped out, and Ian Lewis Jr. broke his bat on a grounder, and in just eight pitches GB went down 1,2,3.
Skirmish four to Mexico
Anderson started the third strong with a swinging strikeout of Joey Ortiz and Jarren Duran before facing his second battle with Randy. This time, Randy showed more patience and didn’t swing at the first five pitches. He thought the last of those five had earned him a walk, but the ump called it a strike, and Anderson got Arozarena to poke on to left field, and quick-footed Koperniak got to it.
Three innings and 54 pitches on 1-run ball was probably the 70th-80th percentile outcome for GB from Jack Anderson.
Skirmish five to GB
Trayce started the bottom of the third for Team GB and quickly struck out on 3 pitches. That brought Jazz back up for a second bite of the cherry. This ended with a groundout to Nick Gonzales at second. Eaton patiently waited in his second battle against Assad, but that ended with a routine flyout to centre.
Skirmish six to Mexico
Nick Wells took the mound for Team GB in the fourth and got Aranda to ground out quickly before facing a fan favourite in Alejandro Kirk. Kirk also grounded out quickly, and Rowdy Tellez came up. He hit a massive pop-up to Ivan Johnson in foul territory on the third base side. In just 10 pitches, Wells retired the side and kept GB in the game,
Skirmish seven to GB
Assad was more efficient with his innings, and so he stayed out for the fourth. That earned him a second time around against Ford and Murray, who reached base in the first. Ford earned himself a walk on six pitches, swinging at none of them. A leadoff base runner – a first for either team. Ford’s speed and three outs to play meant that Team GB would have probably thought they’d get another PA with runners in scoring positions. But B.J. Murray hit the perfect grounder to turn the double play.
Assad was then switched for lefty Brennan Bernandino to match up with GB’s lefty Matt Koperniak. Bernandino won the battle, getting Koperniak to chase an outside curve.
Skirmish eight to Mexico
Wells continued in quick fashion, getting the only run scorer of the game so far to pop out on three pitches and then a strikeout on three pitches to Gonzales and a groundout in four against Thomas. Keeping GB right in the game with just one run needed to tie it up.
Skirmish nine to GB
Bernandino stayed out for Mexico, showing he wasn’t just LOOGY for Koperniak. And that looked like a wise decision when he struck out Robinson and encouraged Johnson to ground out on the first pitch. But Lewis Jr. knocked in a single, and there wasn’t any chance in the world he was gonna be left in place for Trayce Thompson.
Cardinals’ prospect Luis Gastelum entered looking for the third out. He managed to hit Lewis Jr. while attempting a pickoff. Thompson hit a single to left field, and because Lewis Jr was stealing, he dived into second. He then got back up and went to third. He was ruled out at third because they said he never touched second base. But that call was overturned, and GB had runners on the corners with Jazz up and two outs.
Lost in all of this was the fact that Alvarez Jr. made a farce of an easy tag at third.
This was the first key moment of the game. Which built up to a storm in the stadium when Luis Gastelum’s pitchcom had to be checked as it wasn’t working. Jazz made contact but lined out to Duran in RF, and GB left the corners loaded for a second time. Two key opportunities missed, but GB were still in the game due to pitching staff dealing.
Skirmish 10 to Mexico
Ryan Long was handed the ball for the sixth inning, but issued the first walk to Mexico on just four pitches, before plunking Duran. That brought up Randy with a chance to take this game away from GB. Out went the pitching coach to try to calm everything down. But it didn’t look like it was going to work, two more balls from Long before he got Randy to foul one off. With the count at 2-1, Long got a big swing and miss. Randy took the next one before striking out. Big first out.
The crowd thought the game was blown open, but Aranda’s line drive was run down by Trayce Thompson, and it was only a sac fly and not a double or a homer.
Up stepped Kirk, Durran stole on the first pitch but Kirk was quickly down 0-2. He then hit a huge pop fly to Trayce, and Long made it out of the inning unscathed. GB were still down by just one.
Skirmish 11 to GB
Alex Carrillo came into pitch, and Eaton led off for GB. He fouled a few off but couldn’t find the solid contact and popped out to short centre. Eyes once again turned to Harry Ford, who didn’t disappoint GB fans. He deposited it in the Crawford Boxes and tied the game up. Before putting on a Bearskin Hat, GB’s new celebration gear for this tournament.
That silenced the Mexican fans shortly but the strikeout of B.J. Murray had them back with a solid voice.
Mexico then went to the bullpen, and Samy Natera Jr., another lefty, was brought in to face Koperniak. This time it didn’t work, and a four-pitch walk meant the go-ahead run was on the bases for team GB.
Natera Jr. struggled against Robinson as well. Kristian drew a six-pitch walk, which gave GB runners on first and second with Ivan Johnson at the plate. Mexico predictably did a mound visit to just slow everything down for their pitcher. Johnson took a big hack on the first and second pitches and found himself down 0-2.
The at-bat lasted longer than expected, with balls and fouls coming a plenty before he hit a single. But the inning ended there as GB sent Koperniak home, and he was dead to rights by nearly 20 ft. That’s one which the scouting report should have said not to run on. The LF is very short because of the Crawford Boxes.
GB tied it up, but they probably should have been ahead.
Skirmish 12 to GB
Gary Gill Hill came in to pitch the seventh inning for GB and got Tellez down 0-2, but the veteran worked the count back in his favour before popping out to left field. Gill Hill struck out Alvarez Jr., but Nick Gonzales nearly snuck one over the fence in the right field corner, but it ended up a few short and safely in Thompson’s glove.
Skirmish 13 to GB
Robert Garcia came into face GB for the bottom of the seventh. And quickly dispatched Lewis Jr. and Thompson. The GB lineup started again for the fourth time, and Jazz had another opportunity to shine, but unlike his co-captain, it eluded him. A 4-3 grounder ended the seventh quickly.
Skirmish 14 to Mexico
Gill Hill stayed on the mound for the top of the eighth. He struck out Alek Thomas and Joey Ortiz before facing the Mexican lead-off Duran. The Red Sox outfielder hit a monster foul, which had the Mexican fans on the first base side on their feet, but it wasn’t ever close. Duran earned a walk and brought up Arozarena. The Mexican fans got loud. But Randy walked, so they didn’t get the outcome they wanted, but they didn’t have to wait long.
Outcome: Aranda to bat and Marcelino quickly followed. Gill Hill went as far as he could, and Tristan Beck entered the game. The Beck brothers have been a great talking point leading up to the tournament, and in the morning press conference, they joked that whenever they play together, it usually ends up going well. It worked in High School and College, could it work at the WBC? The answer was no.
After the age of warm-up, Beck threw two noncompetitive inside pitches before Aranda drove the third into the Crawford boxes. A three-run homer which crushed the hearts of GB players and fans alike.
Kirk flew out on the first pitch, but the damage was done. Mexico took a 4-1 lead into the bottom of the eighth.
Skirmish 15 to Mexico
Rockies reliever Victor Vodnik took the ball in the eighth, and GB fans hoped for a Rockies-level performance. Eaton grounded out to Joey Ortiz, who made a lovely play charging in on a chopper. He then backed that up with a lovely play to his left, taking one up the middle away from Harry Ford.
B.J. Murray earned a walk, and Koperniak avoided swinging on the 99 mph high heat coming from Vodnik to earn another walk. That brought the tying run back up to the plate.
Like clockwork, Benji Gil came out to chat to Vodnik to try and calm him down. Vodnik got Robinson to chase some off-speed, but Robinson fought back to bring the count full, before hitting a slow chopper to Alvarez Jr. at third. He fielded it cleanly, and the throw to first was in time to end the GB rally.
Skirmish 16 to Mexico
Mexico entered the ninth with a 4-1 lead, and GB brought out Graham Spraker to try to keep GB’s hope alive. In the first AB against Tellez, Spraker picked up a first for GB players. Not one he would have wanted, though, as he became the first GB player to commit a pitch clock violation.
Tellez walked and was pinch-run for at first by Jared Serna. Spraker was then high with his first three pitches to Alvarez Jr. before finding the zone on the fourth. Spraker threw his two pickoffs, which meant Serna was going to have basically a free go at second, but it didn’t matter, as it was ball four. Then the game’s steadfast tradition of mound visit after two walks continued.
He got Gonzales to hit what looked like a perfect double play ball, but it was just slow enough off the bat that the relay from short to second to first wasn’t in time for the second out.
Spraker still looked a little out of control in his PA against Alek Thomas, wasting an 0-2 count and allowing Gonzales to steal second on a high pitch. That brought the infielders in to try and stop a squibbler scoring a run. Instead, Thomas hit one hard up the middle to plate two more for Mexico. The stolen base changed the defence, and what would have been a double-play ball scored two.
The lead stretched to 6-1, and GB turned to Dylan Covey, who gave up a double, and Mexico stretched that lead even further. Durran grounded out to Jazz, but Randy hit another single, and the British challenge faded away. Mexico moved to 8-1 up. Aranda struck out on the foul tip to end the inning.
Skirmish 17 and the Battle to Mexico
Then, just to rub salt into the wounds, because Mexico isn’t playing tomorrow, they brought one of the best closers in baseball to finish the game off. Two-time All-Star, Andres Munoz entered.
Johnson struck out chasing a slider, but Ian Lewis Jr. got a single to LF to potentially bring the top of the order back into play. Thompson hit a double into the left field corner, and the gap was reduced to six runs.
Jazz and Eaton who had yet to reach bases needed to extend the rally but Jazz went down swinging and Nate flew out to right field to end what started as a great showing and ended in mini drubbing.
Mexico won 8-2.
There are positives to take from this game: the middle and the bottom of the lineup hit well, and there were some great pitching performances, but the Jazz and Eaton both went 0-for-5 and their top relievers struggled.
After the game, Brad Marcelino said that Team GB didn’t execute well enough in some key moments, while Mexico did, which was the difference in the end. To him, it wasn’t a shock that they stuck with Mexico for so long, even if it was to others.
Saying “We expected it. I don’t know if ‘hang’ for us is the right word, because we expected to go in and win. There were a couple of things that hurt us from an execution standpoint, some big pieces there.”
Brad was, however, happy with the aggressive send in the bottom of the sixth, saying, “Yeah, I love it. Love the send. You know what the back end of that bullpen looks like. All of those guys are high-leverage guys. It is hard enough to stack and build an inning.”
Mexico have the day off, and GB have the evening game against Team US, knowing they need something from that game to likely progress out of the group stage.
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