Netherlands shuts out Gateway Community College
The Netherlands pounded the team of Gateway Community College by a score of 15-0 for their first win during training camp in Arizona. After two losses against teams from the Korea Baseball Organisation (KBO) they got ahead quickly on Thursday, taking a 9-0 after three innings. Dwayne Kemp collected three doubles and missed a grand slam barely. The Dutch team will face the LG Twins, also from KBO.
Source link: http://www.mister-baseball.com/
According to both the WBSC and IBAF rankings, the Netherlands holds a great 5th place in the world, so I expected that baseball is kind of a big thing here. I’ve been a baseball enthusiast for a couple of years now, but it’s irrelevant back at home, therefore I was looking forward to finding an amateur team to play in here (I’m an exchange student at Utrecht University). And now I see how good their teams really are. Also, the main reason the dutch team is good, is that a lot of players originate from Aruba and Curaçao, where the sport is huge. Not all of them come to the Netherlands to play, but they go directly to the USA (or other leagues) if they’re good enough. But still baseball isn’t much of a thing in Europe, sadly.