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Team USA misunderstood Puerto Rico's post-WBC celebration plans

U.S. pitcher David Robertson, left, and infielder Nolan Arenado celebrate the team's 8-0 win over Puerto Rico in the final of the World Baseball Classic in Los Angeles, Wednesday, March 22, 2017. (AP Photo/Mark J. Terrill)
U.S. pitcher David Robertson (L) and infielder Nolan Arenado celebrate the team’s 8-0 win over Puerto Rico. (AP Photo)

The World Baseball Classic has sadly come to an end, with Team USA beating Team Puerto Rico 8-0 on Wednesday night to win its first WBC championship. The U.S. players seemed singularly possessed right out of the gate, notching 13 hits on the night compared to Puerto Rico’s three.

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What helped the team to victory? Adam Jones revealed one of Team USA’s secrets.

Ahh, classic bulletin-board fodder! Jones heard that the Puerto Rican team already had a parade planned, which implied that the team thought they were going to win without even playing the game. ESPN also reported that Puerto Rico already had victory shirts printed, and Andrew McCutchen told ESPN he wasn’t a fan of that.

“It didn’t sit well,” Andrew McCutchen said. “We heard and we saw T-shirts were made and printed out for the Puerto Rican team. We even heard a flight was made for them for that parade because they said they were going to win. That ignited us, we were ready to go, and we showed that tonight.”

The team didn’t like that Puerto Rico was appearing to assume victory before a single pitch was thrown, and Andrew McCutchen said that helped them play with such intensity.

All these guys did was react based on information they’d “heard.” But there’s a little matter of the actual truth.

No matter what, the Puerto Rican team was flying to the island for a parade. Carlos Correa of Team Puerto Rico confirmed that to ESPN.

“It’s funny because they have been talking about that, but it’s all about the country; it’s not about our team,” Correa said. “Our country has been behind us since we have started [the tournament]. When we were in Mexico, we told the governor in Puerto Rico that if we made it to the finals, we need to plane to get back and celebrate with our people.”

So the parade was going to either celebrate their WBC victory, or celebrate their overall WBC accomplishments, but there was going to be a parade no matter what. Puerto Rico has been so swept up in the WBC and so supportive of its players that the island was literally running out of blonde hair dye because people wanted their hair to match the players’ hair.

Correa also pointed out that the misunderstanding might have deeper roots than just thinking a team is planning a victory parade in advance, because the two teams think about the WBC very differently.

“It’s as simple as this: If you ask Angel Pagan, if you ask Yadi Molina if it feels better than a World Series, they would say yes,” Correa said. “If you ask one of the American guys, they will say, ‘No, not even close.’ So that just tells you the way we play when we represent our country is a lot different than when they play. A lot of their guys say no to the baseball classic. None of our main guys say no to the baseball classic.”

Bulletin-board fodder serves a very specific purpose. It’s about inspiring players to take their strong emotions and use them while they play. So it’s not necessarily about truth. If Team USA had known the whole story, who knows if it would have sat better with them.

Regardless, it worked (or at least helped). The USA came out swinging and didn’t give Puerto Rico a chance to catch up. But losing isn’t going to stop Puerto Rico from celebrating: the team is still headed back home for a parade so the players and fans can share the joy of baseball together.

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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