Team USA tops D.R. 2-1, reaches WBC final
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- Team USA beat the Dominican Republic 2-1 in Sunday's WBC semifinal before a sold-out crowd of 36,337 at LoanDepot Park in Miami, advancing to face the winner of Monday's Italy-Venezuela game in Tuesday's championship.
- Mason Miller closed out the victory, but the final out came on a called strike three to Geraldo Perdomo on a low slider that Perdomo and Dominican manager Albert Pujols both called a ball; the automated ball-strike system was unavailable for the WBC.
- Junior Caminero opened the scoring with a 401-foot homer off Paul Skenes in the second inning, the Dominican Republic's tournament-record 15th home run of the WBC.
- Gunnar Henderson and Roman Anthony answered in the fourth with back-to-back blasts totaling 821 combined feet, flipping a 1-0 deficit into a 2-1 USA lead.
- Julio Rodriguez robbed Aaron Judge of a potential home run with a leaping catch at the center-field wall, one of multiple highlight-reel defensive plays in a game rosters that included 25 ESPN Top 100 players.
- Paul Skenes surrendered just the one Caminero homer over 4⅓ innings, and David Bednar escaped a seventh-inning jam by striking out Fernando Tatis Jr. and Ketel Marte with runners on second and third.
- Mark DeRosa said Mets prospect Nolan McLean will start Tuesday's championship game for the United States.
Why it matters: With 25 ESPN Top 100 players split between the rosters, the semifinal was the WBC's marquee matchup, and Team USA's win sends it to its first championship game since 2017. The controversial final pitch, called a ball by both teams, spotlights the ABS rollout gap: the system debuts in MLB in 2026 but wasn't available for the international tournament because some WBC host ballparks lack the technology.
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