TAINAN, Taiwan – The 12U National Team continues VI World Baseball Softball Confederation (WBSC) U-12 Baseball World Cup Super Round play on Friday with a matchup against host Chinese Taipei. First pitch is set for 6:30 p.m. local/6:30 a.m. ET from Asia-Pacific Main Stadium in Tainan, Taiwan.
Team USA is coming off a dramatic walk-off win against Mexico on Thursday. The team battled back on multiple occasions and won on a walk-off single by Anthony Ramon, which came after a game-tying homer by Cristian Matos.
The United States owns a 5**-**0 overall record at the VI WBSC U-12 Baseball World Cup. Per WBSC rules, the squad is 3-0 in the Super Round after beating Group B representatives, the Domincan Republic and Korea, in pool play action.
Colin Anderson homered again on Thursday against Mexico and now has four homers and 16 RBIs on the tournament. He is batting .636 (7-for-11), with all his hits going for extra bases.
Anthony Frausto had three hits in the win over Mexico and is now batting .818 (9-for-11) to lead all players. Frausto has two doubles and two homers under his belt so far in the tournament.
Batting from the leadoff spot, Jonah Saken has gotten a hit in every game of the tournament thus far. The outfielder is batting .571 (8-for-14), also scoring a team-best 10 runs.
On the mound, the U.S. has combined to post a 2.89 team ERA. Levi Kerr, who got two clutch outs out of the bullpen against Mexico, is now 2-0 with a 0.00 ERA and five strikeouts over 5.2 innings. Four other Team USA arms have posted scoreless outings.
Friday’s Super Round contest will be the sixth-ever meeting between the U.S. and Chinese Taipei at the U-12 level. Team USA leads the all-time series, 3-2, and won most recently in 2017.
The Super Round battle will be the fourth all-time meeting between the U.S. and Mexico at the U-12 level. Team USA has a 2-1 record in the matchup, with Mexico picking up its win at the 2019 WBSC U-12 Baseball World Cup.
The U.S., which owns a world-best three world titles at the U-12 level, won all three of its championships in three consecutive events (2013, 2015, 2017). Team USA went 6-2 in the tournament in 2019 but did not earn a medal for the only time in program history.
The 2022 U.S. roster comprises players who were selected from two USA Baseball identification events. Fourteen players on the roster participated in the 2022 Futures Invitational in June and four athletes played in the 2021 National Team Identification Series (NTIS) Champions Cup last summer. In addition, the roster comprises players from nine different states. California leads all states with six representatives, while Texas follows with five players.
The stars and stripes are led by skipper RJ Farrell in 2022, who returns to the post for the second consecutive season. Farrell led the U.S. to an unbeaten record in a three-game exhibition slate in 2021, outscoring opponents 55-3. The manager has a plethora of experience on 12U National Team coaching staffs, spending three seasons as an assistant coach. In that role, he helped lead Team USA to gold medals at the 2017 WBSC U-12 Baseball World Cup and the 2018 COPABE U-12 Pan American Championships.
Farrell is joined on staff by pitching coach Seth Kenny and assistant coaches Troy Gerlach and Tanner Vesely. Kenny will reprise his role as pitching coach in 2022 after making his national team coaching debut a summer ago, when his pitching staff posted a 1.29 ERA and struck out 33 batters in 21 innings pitched. Gerlach assumes the role of assistant coach on the 2022 staff, bringing with him a gold medal from the 2018 WBSC U-15 Baseball World Cup, where he was an assistant coach. Also serving as an assistant is four-time gold medalist Vesely for the second consecutive year. Vesely, who has been a member of six national team staffs, won the 2015 WBSC U-12 Baseball World Cup as manager and has been an assistant on three other gold-medal winning squads.
To follow along with all the action at the WBSC U-12 Baseball World Cup, be sure to follow @USABaseball12U on Twitter and @USABaseball on Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, and Twitter.
