USA down Dominican Republic to keep gold medal dream alive at Olympics

The United States defeated the Dominican Republic 3-1 in their Round 2 Repechage baseball meeting on Wednesday August 4, to progress to the semi-finals at the Tokyo 2020 Olympics.

Triston Casas’ first inning homer drove himself and Tyler Austin in for two, then Austin hit a home run of his own in the bottom of the 5th to make it three runs to zero.

A late rally from the Dominican Republic came when Charlie Valerio crushed one to right field but with the bases empty it was too little too late and pitcher David Robertson saw it out for the U.S.

Scott Kazmir was the stand-out pitcher with five strike-outs for Team USA.

It means that Team USA stay in the hunt for gold and now play a semi-final on Thursday 5 August against the loser of Japan and Republic of Korea.

If the U.S. win that match they are through to the final against the winner of Japan-Republic of Korea, while the Dominicans now go straight to the bronze medal match on Saturday 7 August.

For Team USA today’s game against Dominican Republic came 48 hours after an epic 7-6 defeat to Japan in 10 innings and there is a chance we could see a rematch in the gold medal final.

USA gave up a 6-3 lead against Japan to lose a nail-biter by one in the tenth on Monday, but two days later, again leading by three, they saw it out despite the late scare from Valerio’s homer.

Robertson closed it out in the ninth striking out Yefri Perez.

Survive and advance. #ForGlory🇺🇸 #TeamUSA #Olympics pic.twitter.com/P6yPxzooBK

— USA Baseball (@USABaseball) August 4, 2021

USA take their chances

The U.S had three hits, three errors and three runs in the game, capitalising on their opportunities, while it was disappointment for los dominicanos who couldn’t make their five hits count.

Three-time MLB All-Star pitcher Scott Kazmir started for the Stars and Stripes and had work on his hands early to keep the Dominicans off the board, he managed to escape a bases-loaded jam in the top of the 1st inning.

Then in the 5th he worked his magic once more with Dominicans Juan Francisco, Julio Rodriguez, and Erick Mejia poised to score after some loose US fielding.

Giants southpaw Kazmir pitched five shut-out innings in all and put the States on the path to victory.

21-year-old Triston Casas has been a revelation for the North Americans at Tokyo 2020, he scored half of the U.S.’ runs against Japan and had another home-run at the Yokohama Baseball stadium taking his batting average to .308, third in the team behind Eddy Alvarez and Tyler Austin.

Cases is a minor leaguer in the Boston Red Sox system, and has done his career no harm at all here in the Japanese capital.

Now the U.S. rest up and wait-and-see who their semi-final opponent is for tomorrow’s game.