David Wright woke up Teams USA’s offense with a grand slam In the fifth inning in the United States beat Italy 6-2 late Saturday night in the World Baseball Classic. The USA Bounced back from a 5-2 loss to Mexico on Friday night and will meet Canada in the final game of Pool D play on Sunday with the winner advancing to the second round.
Italy (2-1) clinched a second-round berth for the first time in its WBC history when Mexico lost to Canada earlier Saturday.
Ryan Vogelsong gave up two runs early but then settled down to get the victory. The San Francisco right-hander pitched 4+ innings, allowing two runs and six hits while striking out four. Washington’s Ross Detwiler blanked Italy on one hit over the final four innings to get the save.
Ryan Braun narrowly missed a home run on a foul ball to deep left but struck out, then Joe Mauer walked to load the bases.
That set the stage for Wright’s heroics, and the New York Mets slugger hit Matt Torra‘s 1-2 pitch over the left field wall several rows into the seats and the United States had its first lead of the tournament, 6-2.
