How many things went through your mind during the course of those events between Cuba and Puerto Rico at the World Baseball Classic?
This is an unprecedented event, and it forces the observer watching it live to view everything from different perspectives. There were some truly wild moments, tempers were rising, the rain was falling, national pride was at stake, elite Major League players were letting it all hang out, the mystery team of the tournament was showing how it plays baseball and you were just glad that the evening ended with everyone healthy and accounted for.
The phenomenal theatrics started in the top of the seventh, when Cuban shortstop Eduardo Paret clearly was pulled off the bag at second while trying to turn a double play, prompting his manager, Higinio Velez, to come out and argue vociferously through an interpreter. Velez was ejected -- amazing considering what crucial situations would follow -- which prompted some Cuban players to wander aimlessly toward the field.
These are the two teams that traded hit batsmen, which had led to ejections in the previous round, and you started to wonder where this was going. Suddenly, you were wondering what Mets fans were thinking as Carlos Beltran, their star center fielder, was swinging at the plate in a huge at-bat while two Cuban coaches were wandering nonchalantly toward the field from the dugout. Where were they going?
You looked at Bernie Williams, and he almost calmed your nerves when you saw that typical Bernie calm in the middle of what seemed like a storm. Bizarre situations, players standing outside of the dugouts and chirping at players in the other dugout, everything seemingly a world away from normal, but through it all, an incredibly high level of baseball.
There was Pudge Rodriguez, as intense as you ever have seen him in his Major League career. You remembered him blocking the plate in San Francisco to win the 2003 National League Division Series for the Florida Marlins. Now he was ending an inning by trying to score on Beltran\'s hit, and then, after being tagged out on the relay, slamming his helmet to the ground to typify the emotion of the moment. Maybe you were thinking from the Detroit Tigers\' perspective: He might have just tried to bowl over the Cuban catcher, and what a thought that might have been.
There was a near-Kirk Gibson moment, when Carlos Delgado stepped onto the on-deck circle to prepare for his first at-bat of the World Baseball Classic. Hiram Bithorn Stadium was quaking as never before, those in the stands seeing their native son in a spectacular situation. And then Delgado, after dealing with elbow tendinitis, laced a single to right on his first swing. That was a special moment.
While you were trying to imagine the disappointment that the host nation would feel if the Puerto Ricans should be eliminated, maybe you also were thinking about what life must have been like at that moment on the island of Cuba. According to reports, 90 percent of the TV sets there had been tuned to the World Baseball Classic for the previous game. This was their moment to be compared with the most elite players in the world, not just another international tournament to dominate but the international tournament.
Nerves. No matter which country you call home, you had to feel the national pride that was at stake for these two Caribbean nations, and you probably felt your heart beat a little faster with every pitch.
There was Pudge again for the final at-bat, before he would either go to San Diego for the semifinals or return to the Tigers\' Spring Training camp. There were the Cuban players on top of the dugout as usual, just waiting to release all that pent-up emotion with unrestrained glee. There was Beltran again, just waiting on deck for maybe one last chance, and Mets fans waiting to see if he comes home to them or goes on.
And then there it was, the final swing and miss, then big Pedro Luis Lazo and those Cuban players thundering toward the mound in an amazing celebration, and the looks of deflated anger on the faces of the Puerto Rican players who now will scatter their separate ways. Just as Venezuela\'s was, Puerto Rico\'s unbelievably talented roster suddenly was forced to disband, just an ephemeral piece of history.
You wondered what Cuba would be like after all it took just to get it into the World Baseball Classic. Now you know.
You tried to imagine what the World Baseball Classic would be like. Now you know.
There has never been anything like it. And it\'s not over.
', tagline: 'Mark Newman is enterprise editor for MLB.com.', summary: null, article_photo: { caption: 'The Cubans are headed to the semifinals of the World Baseball Classic to take on the Dominican Republic.', credit: 'Ricardo Arduengo/AP', path: '/images/2006/03/15/zLstZ98j.jpg' }, sub_headline: 'Ejections, emotions, excitement make for a true Classic', alt_headline: 'Cuba vs. P.R.: Simply unbelievable', related_links: null, headline: 'Cuba vs. P.R.: Simply unbelievable' }