![\"\"](\"http:\/\/totfc.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/07\/koreafail.jpg\")
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It\u2019s that time of the year again, when baseball begins to permeate into my writing, into my daily activities, and into life itself.\u00a0 Technically, it\u2019s still a month away before the Major League Baseball season begins, and I go back to rooting for the Atlanta Braves again, but there\u2019s still meaningful baseball being played currently in parts of the world, as the World Baseball Classic has been going on for a week now.\u00a0 I should say there\u00a0was\u00a0<\/em><\/strong>meaningful baseball being played, because in my case, my main involvement with the WBC has always been that Team Korea has always been present and played well at prior WBCs and international baseball tournaments in general.\u00a0 Well, they were knocked out of the WBC this morning, and despite playing in the semi-finals and the finals respectively in 2006 and 2009, they\u2019re bounced in the first round this time.<\/span><\/p>\n It\u2019s really ironic how it all happened too, considering that in the four-team pool that Korea was in, three teams went 2-1, with Australia embarrassing themselves going 0-3.\u00a0 But Korea didn\u2019t do themselves any favors, getting embarrassed themselves, getting blanked against\u00a0Curacao<\/span>\u00a0the Netherlands in the first game, which put them in the wrong side of a tie-break situation, which ended up coming to fruition, resulting the favored Koreans getting bounced, despite winning their last game against the cheating Taiwanese.<\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n Leave it to Taiwan, who were playing in their own country and illegally scouted the Korean team way in advance, to\u00a0still lose <\/strong>to the superior Korean team, but due to a technicality in a flawed round-robin format, manage to advance.\u00a0 Sounds like Taiwan advancing in the most Taiwan way possible, which is about the norm.<\/span><\/p>\n But it\u2019s all in the past now.\u00a0 And as terrible as it is to say it, I\u2019m not really upset about Korea getting bounced this early.<\/span><\/p>\n Because I\u2019m pretty sure I\u2019m the worst baseball fan on the planet.<\/span><\/p>\n But it\u2019s not like Korea was entirely without blame.\u00a0 Their relief pitching was putrid, and none of their batters came to play.\u00a0 The team relied on their best bat \u2013 from 2006; to recreate the magic, at the baseball-ancient age of 36.\u00a0 The Koreans gave away outs on the basepaths with terrible base-running and decisions.\u00a0 Korea\u2019s fielding was not nearly as crisp or machine-efficient as they had been in all prior international tournaments, and simply put, nobody was getting on base.\u00a0 It\u2019s beyond obvious that the Korean team underestimated their pool opponents, especially\u00a0Curacao<\/span>\u00a0the Netherlands, and that ended up being the one game that cost them the most.<\/span><\/p>\n Anyway, with Korea out of the tournament, it really means that I\u2019m liberated in a sense from having to really care about the WBC any further.\u00a0 Sure, it would be nice to actually see the United States win at the tournament that they created.\u00a0 But considering they continue to practice the notion of cobbling together talent instead of constructing a team, I can\u2019t really say I expect it, especially with two-time winning Japan still in contention. But really, at this point, I don\u2019t really care who wins it.\u00a0 I have more time for myself and don\u2019t feel obligated to really watch anymore WBC baseball, unless I\u2019ve got nothing else to do.<\/span><\/p>\n I have to imagine that such a notion kind of does make me a pretty bad fan.\u00a0 Now I really do love baseball, and I do enjoy watching baseball, but I think I\u2019m getting to a point where I\u2019d rather watch it live than on television.\u00a0 But at the same time, going to the ballpark is kind of exasperating, unless it\u2019s a minor league park, or it\u2019s a completely new place.\u00a0 So as you can see, I\u2019m kind of at this weird place with my baseball fandom, where the littlest things are going to throw things off.<\/span><\/p>\n Another instance of my terrible fandom happened last October; the Braves had won 94 games, and were serious contenders.\u00a0 But due to an absolutely stupid rule change of integrating a second Wild Card team, the always-dangerous St. Louis Cardinals snuck in the back door, beat the Braves in an absurd one-game playoff, and ended the Braves\u2019 season in a single game.<\/span><\/p>\n Sure, I was incensed that the Braves\u2019 season ended in such an absurd fashion, but I got over it real quick-like.\u00a0 I know of Braves fans that are\u00a0still<\/em>\u00a0bitter about the ending of last season, as if they were unaware that at the start of any given baseball season, your team one of 30 teams vying for the World Series crown.<\/span><\/p>\n But it\u2019s not that I got over the Braves\u2019 loss quickly, it\u2019s the fact that I was kind of\u00a0relieved<\/em><\/strong>\u00a0that the Braves were done.\u00a0 The same goes for Korea\u2019s elimination.\u00a0 With my respective favored teams out of the running for glory, it means that I\u2019m free of the obligation of having to care.\u00a0 After the Braves were bounced, I felt this feeling of liberation at knowing that I could take my trips to Disney and then Mexico, without having to give one iota of concern to what was happening in the baseball world.\u00a0 The same feelings are in play right now, for Korea\u2019s elimination; the rest of the WBC is kind of meaningless to me now, and if I manage to make it down to Miami in a few weeks to catch one of the WBC games, then the outcome of that game has no meaning to me, instead of fretting on which team would be the less-favorable matchup for Korea in the finals.<\/span><\/p>\n It\u2019s hard for me to really explain, but I don\u2019t necessarily think that such a mindset is really good for a baseball fan.\u00a0 Or maybe it\u2019s that I\u2019m growing up, or maybe it\u2019s that baseball as a whole is losing its importance with me.\u00a0 Either way, the fact that I feel relief when my favorite teams fail in critical win-or-go-home games can\u2019t really be a good thing.\u00a0 I should be wanting them to win every single game, but at the same time, I kind of don\u2019t want the stress that comes with living and dying with every single pitch, hit, and run anymore.<\/span><\/p>\n I confuse myself, sometimes.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" It\u2019s that time of the year again, when baseball begins to permeate into my writing, into my daily activities, and into life itself.\u00a0 Technically, it\u2019s still a month away before the Major League Baseball season begins, and I go back to rooting for the Atlanta Braves again, but there\u2019s still meaningful baseball being played currently … Continue reading I think I\u2019m the worst baseball fan in the world<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[62,66,45,103,15],"class_list":["post-35356","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-brog","tag-baseball","tag-braves","tag-fail","tag-motherland","tag-og"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/totfc.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35356","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/totfc.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/totfc.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/totfc.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/totfc.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=35356"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/totfc.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35356\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":35358,"href":"https:\/\/totfc.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35356\/revisions\/35358"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/totfc.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=35356"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/totfc.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=35356"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/totfc.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=35356"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}