U.S.A., U.S.A., U.S.A.!

The US baseball team squared off against Japan this morning (this night in China) to see who would play whom in the semi-finals. The four contenders for the medals were already set, with Korea (7-0) receiving the one seed, Cuba (6-1) the two seed. US and Japan were tied at 4-2.
The game was scoreless through 9. Then scoreless through 10. Then those WACKY Olympics implemented their fucking ridiculous planned rule to avoid marathon games. You see, if a game goes to the 11th inning, the teams get to start with any batter they want in their order. Oh, I forgot to mention....place the hitters in the two previous batting order positions on 1st and 2nd base, and start with 0 outs. I swear to Jesus, Abner Doubleday and Alexander Cartwright are fucking spinning in their graves. They're begging Jesus for a reincarnation so they can come back as car bombs, to be planted on the automobile of whomever came up with this bastardization of their life's work. (They should probably split up, and take out a high ranking Frenchie, as they are the main suspects right now. Fucking frogs.)
So, Davey Johnson puts his 8 hitter, Jason Donald, on 2nd and his 9 hitter, Dexter Fowler, on 1st. His lead-off man is at the plate, Mr. Brian Barden. The US squad goes all BANZAI! on the Japanese, rifling off three straight singles to make it 3-0. (Singles and RBIs complements of Barden, Nate Schierholtz, and Matt Brown.) Terry Tiffee strikes out (Really, Terry? You now hold a spot next to Benedict Arnold on my shit list. Please hit three homeruns in the semi-final to redeem yourself.) to make it 1st and 3rd with one out. John Gall grounds out to the first baseman for the 2nd out, but Schierholtz scoots his lil' behind home for a fourth run. Mike Hessnan decides that's all we need, and flies out to the 1st baseman to end the top of the 11th.
Good Guys 4, Baby Killers 0.
Colorado's first round pick from 2007, Casey Weathers, comes on to close out the game. Japan's number 3 hitter is up. Weathers promptly strikes him out, and gets their 4 hitter to fly-out to center. Runners on 1st and 3rd, 2 outs, 4-0. Weathers then does his best [insert Mets bullpen guy's name here] impression, by giving up 3 straight singles and a wild pitch. The score is now 4-2, runners on 2nd and 3rd. Davey boy decided to walk the # 7 guy to get to the # 8 hitter (That's strategy! It's like Iwo Jima all over again. Suck it, Japan!). Japan pulls the #8 guy (who is hitting .220 in the Olympics) for another guy who looks just like him (What? Seriously! He does!), and is hitting .182 these games. Yup. That's the guy you want up there to win it for ya, Japan. This is why you lost WWII. (Well, that and Little Boy and Fat Man, who destroyed 250,000 people.) As you can imagine, the Japanese dude pops out meekly to first base, resulting in a 4-2 win for the Good Guys. The Stars and Stripes. The Land of the Free. The Home of the Brave. The eaters of apple pie. All that good shit.
So, what does all this mean? Well, the US is playing Cuba in the second semi-final game, set for 6 am EDT Friday morning. As butt crack early as that may be, I urge you to watch. Why? Because it's your patriotic fucking duty, that's why! Also, THE STRAUSBURG EXPRESS is throwing. The future National will mow down them Cuban boys and Communism in 9 tidy innings. It makes for must see TV, folks, unlike a certain Major League baseball team. I'm not naming any names, but here's a hint: They play at Latitude: 38° 53' North; Longitude: 77° 02' West. (Yeah! Get your brains working. You've seemed to be on auto-pilot lately.)

If you want to see who our guys are, I recommend visiting usabaseball.com. (Not because it's the greatest site, it's just the least worst. Seriously..there are some clusterfucks of websites out there devoted to US baseball. I'm just protecting you all from them. You're welcome.)