Mark DeRosa’s father, Jack, was one of the most accomplished pitchers ever at Fairleigh Dickinson University, throwing one of only three no-hitters in the history of the baseball program.
When the FDU basketball team upset Purdue Friday night to become only the second 16th seeded team to oust a No. 1 seed in the history of the NCAA men’s tournament, DeRosa, this year’s Team USA manager in the World Baseball Classic, said he “took it as a sign.”
He was right, but not without a lot of sweating and an eighth-inning comeback sparked by Trea Turner’s grand slam. Team USA’s 9-7 win over Venezuela Saturday night at Miami’s LoanDepot Park sent the Americans spinning into the semifinals.
The U.S. will play Cuba on Sunday night, while Japan meets Mexico on Monday night. If the Japanese and Team USA survive their final hurdles, the world will get the Shohei Ohtani-Mike Trout matchup baseball fans have been yearning for in Tuesday night’s finale.
DeRosa said he’ll start his Game 1 winner Adam Wainwright against a Cuba team that hasn’t been back to the WBC semifinals since 2006, when the Cubans ultimately lost the finals to Japan.
“We’re going to hand the ball to Adam. I mean, he’s pitched in every big game known to man,” DeRosa said about a right-hander who won the World Series twice with the St. Louis Cardinals, one as the closer, the other as a starter.
DeRosa is affable, and a good communicator, but his handling of the pitching staff almost cost the U.S. the tournament.
The U.S. blew leads of 3-0, and 5-2 in the quarterfinal game, allowing four runs in the fifth inning when reliever Daniel Bard couldn’t find the plate. Bard, who lost six years of his Major League career because of that issue, allowed an infield hit, walked two, threw a pair of wild pitches and hit Jose Altuve, reportedly breaking his right thumb.
Altuve was the third batter the 37-year-old Bard faced and according to the rules governing this WBC, he could have been removed from the game. He had thrown 17 pitches, 10 of them balls.
Before Altuve came to the plate, pitching coach Andy Pettitte went to the mound. After Bard uncorked the inside pitch that hit Altuve, DeRosa left Bard in for a fourth batter. At that point the next reliever, Jason Adams, wasn’t ready. Bard walked Anthony Santander, to load the bases.
“The problem with that is once we get someone up, they have to come in,” DeRosa said about his delayed move replacing Bard with Adams. “I knew [Adams] had to face three batters once he came in.”
By the time the inning was over, and Venezuela had the lead, the game and the tournament could have been over. Turner, and a prolific offense that produced 15 hits, including two homers, saved the U.S.
“Hey, no one was happier when Trea hit that baseball,” DeRosa said.
To be sure, handling pitching in the WBC is no small task. Pitchers are limited to 65 pitches a game in pool play, and if they throw more than 30 they can’t be used in back-to-back games. That expands to 80 in the knockout round, but as Venezuela discovered it’s single elimination by then and there may not be a next game to worry about.
Plus, there are other limits and restrictions placed on pitchers by their Major League clubs as they prepare for the regular season.
“I can get into it super deep, but you guys are seeing it play out, right?” DeRosa said. “There’s a lot of guys who mean a lot to their big-league ball clubs and their seasons. I’m not going to do anything to jeopardize that.”
In addition, while the best position players available always play for the U.S., the better pitchers don’t. Stars like Justin Verlander, Max Scherzer and Clayton Kershaw have never been available.
The U.S. makes do with a second tier. This year, Lance Lynn, Nick Martinez, Merrill Kelly and 40-year-old Wainwright have been the starters.
Fortunately, Ryan Pressley, one of the game’s top closers has been there to secure the last two games.
“I’ve pretty much pitched in every kind of situation you can imagine, except for starting,” Pressley said. “To go out there and close this game, I mean, it’s special. Every time you get to put on this [U.S.] uniform it’s special.”
DeRosa has had to deal with glitches. During an 11-5 loss to Mexico last week in pool C play, DeRosa used Kendall Graveman for a third of an inning and had to allow Brady Singer to take a pounding during a four-run fourth inning as the game got out of reach. Graveman was restricted by his MLB team, the Chicago White Sox, De Rosa said.
“There’s a lot of honoring some parent-club wishes to try to get these guys ready for the regular season,” DeRosa said at the time. “It’s tough.”
DeRosa, who came off the bench as an MLB Network analyst to manage Team USA without any formal coaching or managing experience, was asked how he would have discussed the game had he put on his TV hat.
“In a perfect world you wouldn’t have liked to have hung Brady out to dry there,” he said. “But the way we’re built, we’ve got to cover innings. That’s just the bottom line. I hated the fact that he had to sit out there north of 30 pitches. But it’s the hand we’re dealt.”
DeRosa’s father pitched his FDU no-hitter in 1964 and in 2017, he was inducted into the school’s Hall of Fame.
The younger DeRosa had a 16-year Major League career for eight teams, much of it as a utility player, finishing with a .268 lifetime batting average.
As the pressure has mounted and his team has gone 4-1 through its first five games, DeRosa, who grew up in New Jersey near Fairleigh’s Teaneck campus, has called this “the most awesome and stressful experience” of his career. He’s looked like a novice at times doing it.
DeRosa said he has no designs on managing once this is all over, and perhaps that’s a good thing. He’s following in the footsteps of veteran Team USA managers Buck Martinez, Davey Johnson, Joe Torre, and Jim Leyland, who led the U.S. to its only WBC victory in 2017. Tommy Lasorda managed the U.S. team that won the baseball gold medal in the 2000 Summer Olympics.
Yet the U.S. remains alive in this competition much like the Knights of Fairleigh Dickinson, who could become the first 16-seed to make the Sweet 16 if they defeat Florida Atlantic Sunday night. They’re playing at about the same time Team USA takes on Cuba.
Not that DeRosa needs anymore inspiration.
