World Baseball Classic 2017: The Netherlands' infield is hard to beat
From now until the World Baseball Classic begins on March 6, we’ll be helping you get to know each team involved in baseball’s global tournament. Today’s entry: The Netherlands.
Back in 2013, the Netherlands went to the WBC with an infield full of young players who weren’t yet well known. Xander Bogaerts, Andrelton Simmons, Jurickson Profar, and Jonathan Schoop helped their team break out, surprising everyone by making it to the semifinals and making Honkbal (the Netherlands’ highest level of professional baseball) everyone’s favorite word.
Four years later, those four players are still relatively young, but much more well-known. And they’re going back to the WBC, joined by Didi Gregorius, to see if they can make it even farther. Four years of experience has done nothing but make these guys better, especially for Bogaerts and Schoop, who both had their MLB debuts in 2013 and have gotten steadily (and fantastically) better since.
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The Netherlands definitely has their infield all locked up, but pitching is the one area where they’re lacking. They have three guys with major league experience in their rotation: Jair Jurrjens, Shairon Martis, and Rick van den Hurk. However, none of them are currently pitching in the majors. Kenley Jansen would be the big name, but he won’t appear unless the team makes it past pool play and into the elimination rounds. They do have Loek van Mil, a former Minnesota Twins prospect who is 7-foot-1 (or perhaps two 3-foot-6 children standing on each other’s shoulders). He wasn’t bad in his time in the minors (3.48 ERA over nearly 400 innings), but the Netherlands is going to need all its pitchers to get hot in order to beat their showing from 2013.
Schedule details: The Netherlands plays in Pool A, and will start their tournament by playing Korea on March 7. They play Chinese Taipei on March 8 and Israel on March 9. After that? Well, that’s up to them.
’13 Finish: They went 4-4 overall in 2013, but they made it to the semi-finals after busting out of pool play with a 2-1 record. In the semis they beat Cuba two separate times, but fell to Japan in the last game of round two and were eliminated.
Biggest stars: It’s definitely that infield quintet of Bogaerts, Simmons, Schoop, Profar and Gregorius, who are stars of varying levels in the MLB. Most notably, Bogaerts, Simmons and Gregorius are all coming off the best seasons of their young careers.
Notable absences: 2013 “father figure” Andruw Jones is not playing in the WBC this year.
Player you should get familiar with: Wladimir Balentien, who’s playing in right field. Balentien survived in the majors for just three years, but resurrected his career in Japan in 2011. “Resurrected” might be an understatement, actually, since in 2013 Balentien set the single-season home run record with 60 dingers.
Do they have a chance to win?: They do have a chance, but it’s incredibly slim. That infield makes it tempting to say yes, but their pitching is quite the obstacle. They could break out and surprise everyone, and they’re bound to do well early on, but once they start facing teams in the knockout rounds, it’s going to be tough to win with what they have.
THREE BIG QUESTIONS ABOUT THE NETHERLANDS
How far can their infield take them? Pretty far. Gregorius and Schoop have power, Simmons has average and Bogaerts has lots of both. But they won’t just help at the plate. They’ll help their pitching staff with their excellent defense. Simmons in particular is utterly amazing defensively, and will be a one-man show over at shortstop.
How will they all find playing time? You may have noticed that five good infielders is actually too many to fit on a baseball diamond. How many teams would love to have the problems that team manager Hensley Meulens has, right? So how will he find playing time for all of them? Carefully. Thankfully, there is some flexibility. Bogaerts has primarily played shortstop, but has also manned third base. (Which is good since both Simmons and Gregorius are also shortstops). Schoop and Profar can both play second and third. So there will be some juggling, but it can be done.
Will everyone still love Honkbal Hoofdklasse? Undoubtedly. That’s the full name of the Netherlands’ own version of MLB, and it’s super fun to say. Honkbal Hoofdklasse is one of the biggest baseball leagues in Europe, and it’s sadly not as well known as the leagues in Japan and Korea. It has eight teams, and the games are played mostly on weekends between April and September. Their version of the World Series is called the Holland Series. Many of the players on the Netherlands team who aren’t from MLB are from Honkbal Hoofdklasse. Fun fact: one of their teams plays their home games in a stadium called Sportpark De Paperclip, which leads to images of a ballpark somehow shaped like a paperclip.
Also in this series:
—Australia
— Canada
— China
— Chinese Taipei
— Colombia
—Cuba
— Dominican Republic
— Israel
— Italy
— Japan
— Korea
— Mexico
— Puerto Rico
— United States
— Venezuelao
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Liz Roscher is a writer for Big League Stew on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email her at lizroscher@yahoo.com or follow her on twitter! Follow @lizroscher
