We’re just a day into Great Britain’s time at the World Baseball Classic, and it has already had an eventful tournament. The team caught the baseball world’s attention with arguably the worst jerseys we’ve seen in any baseball competition. But then the Brits came back with the best baseball celebration we’ve seen.
Come Sunday, though, we were back to witnessing some bad British baseball.
With Darnell Sweeney at the plate against Canada in the fourth inning and two outs, the former Phillies outfielder drove a deep fly ball to right-center field. He was certain the ball was gone — it was not. But it turned out that B.J. Murray — the baserunner on first base — also thought Sweeney left the yard at Chase Field.
Always hustle, kids. pic.twitter.com/DUWCIOLTDF
— FOX Sports: MLB (@MLBONFOX) March 12, 2023
Instead of running, Murray skipped slowly towards second base as he admired the ball. By the time he realized the ball was staying in play, Murray was only able to advance to third base.
The wild part about the whole sequence was that it took place with two outs. Murray should have been running on contact and scoring easily. Instead, Great Britain would lose a run from the mental blunder. In the bottom half of the inning, Canada would break the game open with six runs.
Murray will know to hustle and be aware of the outs next time — that’s for sure.
