Czech Republic are the World Baseball Classic’s underdog stars

It shouldn’t have been a contest. Spain was the closely favored nation on the World Baseball Classic Qualifiers in Regensburg, Germany, this previous September and had already defeated the Czech Republic, 21-7, within the first recreation of the event. Its roster was crammed with ex-Major Leaguers like Rhiner Cruz and Engel Beltre and thrilling younger prospects like Noelvi Marte (No. 29 as ranked by MLB Pipeline).

Compare that to the Czech Republic’s roster: Nearly each participant was born within the small European nation and performed in its novice league, the Czech Baseball Extraliga. The nation hadn’t produced a Major Leaguer since not less than 1952, although present star catcher Martin Červenka has come agonizingly shut with stops in Triple-A with the Mets and Orioles.

Nearly each participant on the Czech roster holds day jobs, squeezing in follow and coaching round life, work and household. Červenka now works in gross sales, whereas captain and DH Petr Zýma is a monetary analyst. Center fielder Arnošt Dubový teaches highschool geography (and provides out further credit score when college students can title that weekend’s Extraliga scores); pitcher and former Pirates farmhand Marek Minařík works in actual property whereas one other of the group’s beginning pitchers, Lukáš Ercoli, doubles as its media coordinator. Even supervisor Pavel Chadim coaches on the aspect. In his day job, he’s the main neurologist in Brno.

There was a lesson in that first loss to Spain: Even although the sport was referred to as early as a result of mercy rule, the Czech Republic hammered three dwelling runs and returned some life to its gamers in its last few frames.

“It was devastating,” Dubový stated. “But at the end of the game, we scored a couple of runs, and got the feeling that we can beat everybody.”

They realized to play with out concern.

“At that point, we knew this is how we have to swing, we have to look for our pitches no matter what the score is,” Zyma stated.

A win towards France and a come-from-behind victory towards Germany arrange the rematch within the finals, with the winner advancing to the World Baseball Classic.

Spain, with its wealth of expertise, ought to have gained. But this time, they didn’t.

Martin Schneider – arguably the best shortstop and pitcher in Czech historical past (he’s additionally a firefighter, natch) – pitched six innings, giving up only one run. He had thrown simply 19 innings through the season and was due to this fact solely purported to pitch in aid. But with all the things on the road, Chadim requested him to start out.

“When Pavel asked me, I said, ‘Hey, you know me. I’m [willing to] die out there tomorrow. So, it’s up to you. It’s your decision,'” Schneider stated. “I was ready for it. I was prepared for it. And I did my best.”

After a heartbreaking loss within the 2017 Classic Qualifiers — and failing to achieve the 2020 Olympics — it had lastly occurred: For the primary time in Czech baseball historical past, the nation can be enjoying within the World Baseball Classic.

“At that point my eyes just exploded,” Zyma stated after the final out was recorded. “I don’t even know how I climbed over the railing. All I know was a few elbows, a lot of sprinting, and I was just maybe worried about my glasses. Once I got into the dog pile, I was just screaming and basically beating everybody. It was a great moment. And I was thinking, ‘Is this really happening? Are we finally [celebrating] a great win?’”

“The celebration was just pure joy, pure happiness,” Schneider said. “A lot of smiles, a lot of drinks, a lot of dancing, singing, some cheers of joy. Yeah, we enjoyed it. Can I say more?”

Some gamers even skipped out on sleep earlier than boarding the group bus again to the Czech Republic within the morning. But for Červenka and a handful of different gamers, they rapidly gathered their issues and had been on the highway following the most important victory of their baseball careers.

“I actually had to leave early,” Červenka stated, “because I had to go to work the next day.”

To understand how the Czech Republic nationwide group bought right here, with its group of amateurs set to compete towards among the finest baseball gamers on the planet, you need to look again at its previous. Unlike in different European nations like Germany the place the sport grew round American navy bases, the Czech Republic has its personal distinctive historical past. When Czechoslovakia was beneath communist rule, baseball was typically appeared upon with suspicion. It was solely due to Cuba’s success within the sport that individuals had been even allowed to play it in any respect.

After some earlier matches and begins, baseball returned to the nation within the Nineteen Sixties and ’70s as pupil golf equipment and softball groups converted to hardball. The Extraliga began play in 1979 and a nationwide group has been competing in worldwide tournaments since 1982. After the iron curtain fell in 1989, U.S. coaches had been allowed into the nation to assist educate gamers and maintain tutorial camps. Since then, the nation has taken off, rising up the WBSC rankings alongside the way in which. The Extraliga now options eight groups in its first division, has its very personal baseball card set, and each recreation is streamed stay worldwide.

Chadim has been across the recreation for a very long time — first enjoying on the nation’s nationwide group within the early Nineteen Nineties after which managing its youth groups since 2003. He oversaw the nation’s two journeys to the Little League World Series in 2013 and ’14 and coached almost each participant on the WBC roster in some unspecified time in the future of their careers. He’s seen the nation’s baseball evolution up shut.

“Quantity, quantity, quantity,” Chadim stated concerning the nation’s first objective in inspiring new baseball gamers a technology in the past. “We had just 2,500 players in the Czech Republic. Now we have 10,000. We started developing with under-10 teams, under-9, under-8, under-7, we now have an under-5.”

The subsequent step got here when the nation imported Mike Griffin to be the supervisor of the nationwide group in 2012. The present head of the Pro5 Baseball Academy in North Carolina — who will return as a bench coach beneath Chadim on this Classic — had one objective: Developing this system into one that would compete on the worldwide stage. He targeted on character, teamwork, and professionalism.

“We wanted to create the mentality that these guys, whenever they stepped on the field, they expected to have a game plan, they expected to win,” Griffin said. “And that’s the hardest thing to overcome in a developing [baseball] country.”

They began with vitamin, making certain gamers had high quality meals when touring and competing in tournaments. They supplied power coaching and conditioning, with entry to gyms to remain in form. Griffin inspired them to play school baseball within the states, with many even residing with him for months at a time.

“We felt like that helped them make the sacrifices to go that extra mile,” Griffin stated. “And then we anticipated all of the nationwide group gamers to be on the sphere 5 days per week. Some days, it may be an hour-and-a-half. And then some days, it may be a full three to 4 hours-plus.”

Two moments made Griffin assume that the plan was working.

The first got here on the 2017 World Baseball Classic Qualifiers in Mexico. After dropping to the host nation by a slender 2-1 rating to start the event, the Czech group misplaced a 7-6 heartbreaker to Nicaragua in further innings. They could have misplaced these video games, however they had been heading in the right direction.

The different got here through the 2019 European Championships, the place the highest 5 groups would get to play within the 2020 Olympic Qualifiers. It made a powerful end crucial. So, when the Czech Republic beat the Netherlands, 8-6, early within the event with their finest pitchers on the mound, they knew this was working.

“We decided that we were gonna throw our best arms against Holland,” Griffin stated. “We felt like we needed to make a statement that we belong at that level, and we want to see our best against their best. Whereas before, a lot of times you’d throw your last pitchers and try to win the other games at the tournament.”

Given the extraordinary time dedication, you would possibly assume it is in all probability taxing to play for the Czech nationwide group — that’s, except enjoying baseball is your primary ardour and love in life. Fortunately, that is precisely how everybody on this group feels.

“Baseball and a personal life and having a job, it’s really tough,” Dubový said. “Normally people finish at four, then go to the practice at five and finish a two-, maybe three-hour practice. Then we go home and you have to spend some time with your family, or girlfriend, with the kids. But the passion for baseball — we are not doing it for money, we are doing it because we love it.”

Červenka’s common day sees him get up at 6 a.m. to get to the workplace at 7 and work till about 4 p.m.

“And then I drive back home, go work out. After the workout, grab myself a meal, have my dinner, and then go to practice. We usually start around 8:00, 8:30 and finish around 10:30 or 11:00.”

There’s not a minute within the day that Červenka has for something apart from work — which he must maintain a roof over his head — or baseball, one thing he can’t stay with out.

“Every now and then, when I’m at work, I do think about hitting,” Červenka stated. “It’s what I’ve been doing my whole life. I mimic my swings in the office here and there, and just try to figure out what I can do better.”

“Once I put my uniform or practice gear on, I’m just a child once again,” stated Zýma — whose household helped discovered the baseball and softball membership Eagles Praha. “I run round and that is what I actually get pleasure from and I like.”

Schneider’s schedule is even crazier: As a firefighter, he is on obligation for twenty-four hours earlier than getting 48 hours off. That means he misses one out of each three Extraliga video games through the common season, so he might be on obligation.

“I’m saying that we are like fanatics,” Ercoli said. “We are sacrificing work, we are sacrificing families or family time, and getting little money from it. We just love baseball and sacrifice everything to it.”

Having a job could make squeezing within the sport all of the tougher, however it could actually additionally supply some perspective that maybe others, whose lives solely revolve round baseball, haven’t got.

“If you see a young, 20-year-old guy [who suffered a] stroke hemiparesis, I thought, ‘How you can be sad when your pitcher is crying because he gave up a home run in some game?’” Chadim requested over lunch at his follow in Brno earlier than calling in one other affected person from his ready room. “If you see how hard life is, how hard many people’s lives are — it helps me. Life is short, enjoy every day. It’s my motto, what I believe.”

Though the love of the sport is the thread that connects all of those gamers, it’s how they genuinely consider one another as a household that retains them going. It’s a phrase that comes up in each interview and a code by which the gamers really stay. When they’re not collectively on the sphere, they’re assembly for dinner or driving throughout the nation to fulfill for snowy, mountainside hikes collectively.

“For me personally, the team is more than family,” Chadim provides. “In a family, you have a brother, you have a sister and you cannot change it. They didn’t do anything to be in this group. But the team is perhaps better because the players and the coaches work so hard to be part of this family.”

“You can feel it, how much we stick together in the national team,” Schneider stated. “It’s only a enjoyable group of fellows.”

Červenka and Ercoli even grew up enjoying baseball collectively in Roudnice nad Labem, a small village about an hour’s drive from Prague. Now that they’re adults and have been doing this for 20 years, after all issues get just a little free between them when dealing with one another within the Extraliga.

“Yeah, so I gave him a chance to strike me out,” Červenka stated, a broad grin on his face. “I let the first two pitches go, it was 0-2. He ended up walking me anyway.”

When Pool B begins play subsequent week in Tokyo, few will choose the Czech Republic to advance. While former Major Leaguer Eric Sogard will now be a part of the Czech Republic for the event, many assume the nation will battle to measure up towards nations like Japan and Korea, whose lineups function superstars like Shohei Ohtani and reigning KBO MVP Award winner Jung-Hoo Lee.

“We proudly call ourselves ‘The heart of Europe,’ because the Czech Republic is really situated in the middle of Europe,” Ercoli stated. “We have barely over 10 million citizens, so it’s a really small country. But I think we’ve shown many times that the world has to contend with the Czech Republic. We have great athletes in ice hockey: Jaromír Jágr, Dominik Hasek, David Pastrňák. We have great soccer players. We shocked the world many times — and we did the same thing in baseball. With this achievement, I think we will write the Czech Republic in the history of baseball, as well.”

They go to Tokyo prepared for something to occur.

​​“We want to show that the Czech Republic – a small country – can do big things,” Dubový stated. “And for me personally, I hate losing. So every loss moves me, pushes me to the limit and to get better.”

The names on the again of their shirts might not be identified around the globe just like the superstars that litter the rosters of different groups, however that doesn’t matter to them. This is baseball and generally odd issues occur. Sometimes David defeats Goliath.

“Every game you go into, you try to win,” Červenka stated. “It starts 0-0, really. So you just do your best, see what happens. Obviously we’re not going to be the favorites, everybody knows that. But we weren’t favorites at the Qualifier. We still qualified, so you never know what can happen.”

This journey — which would require extra trip days and even a substitute instructor in Dubový’s case — is the end result of a lifelong objective: Czech baseball will now be acknowledged on a world stage.

“Sometimes I still feel like, ‘Am I going to be there? Really?’” Schneider requested. “You’re trying to aim for something, but this is something that I never even dreamt of. When you’re young, you want to get to the big leagues. You know from the Czech Republic, that it’s a very, very hard thing to do. But this is as close to that dream I had when I was young.”

They’re not terrified of the problem; they embrace it. Ask every participant whom he hopes to face and you may hear the same reply: “Shohei Ohtani.” Everyone needs the prospect to beat the most effective on the planet.

“We have lots of passion,” Zýma stated. “We like to fight. We hate to lose. We believe that we can actually shock some people.”

Ercoli, who confronted Ohtani at a world youth occasion earlier in his profession (Ohtani doubled and walked) has a plan if the celebrity steps into the field.

“I’ll throw an inside fastball to Shohei Ohtani and see what happens — if he will hit a home run or not,” Ercoli stated, dreaming of the likelihood. “And my strikeout pitch is a slider. Maybe Shohei will get a fastball inside after which a back-foot slider. We’ll see if it’ll work or not.

“There are no other options.”