WORLD BASEBALL CLASSIC: POOL A - NETHERLANDS VS CHINESE TAIPEI

March 11, 2023

Hensley Meulens

Taichung Intercontinental Baseball Stadium

Team Netherlands

Postgame Press Conference

Chinese Taipei 9, Netherlands 5.

HENSLEY MEULENS: Slider, change, and you know, the guys couldn't figure him out. So he threw a few innings there to keep him in the game, kept our guys off-balance, and you know, kept them from scoring.

So you know, good mix of three pitches there that we couldn't figure out, so very good job by him.

Q. (No translation.)

HENSLEY MEULENS: Well, that's why you play the game, right. The game is not played in the bank or on paper. They have a good team. We have to respect that. They can compete. Anybody can win any given game at any given moment. We have to tip our caps to them today, so they kept coming with good at-bats. They pitched well.

Our guys are still pretty good but you know, we've got to play better to win.

Q. (No translation.)

HENSLEY MEULENS: Yes, they all had pretty good stuff. Like I said before, the couple guys had a good mix of changeup, slider, and you know, they didn't use their fastballs much. But the first guy threw side-arm, which was definitely a different look especially for right-handed hitters, slower, a lot of sweeps with breaking ball to the lefties, the ball kind of shoot off a little bit. That was a different look for us. We had good at-bats against them but the second guy really neutralized the game in the middle of the game and obviously the closer took care of business there.

All in all, I think they showed that they can compete in the high level like this tournament is, and you know, hopefully tomorrow we can win a game to advance.

Q. Tomorrow you are going to compete with Italy. As we know, there are many players who are playing in the major leagues right now and are used to the major leagues. How do you think about Italy and of course Taiwan and in the Netherlands, we do have a good relationship, so do you think that we can come to the next level together hand by hand?

HENSLEY MEULENS: I hope so. I think you can't underestimate any opponent. That's what we refuse to do. We've got to play our A Game to beat anybody we play. Today we didn't have our A Game out there because our pitching didn't neutralize the game in the beginning.

So tomorrow, I already told the guys after the game that we have to get some rest, forget about this game. Obviously baseball, you have to have short-term memory and come back fresh tomorrow with a good plan to play our A Game to try to beat the Italians tomorrow to advance to the second round.

So all in all, you know, it doesn't matter how many major league players you got. You've still got to play good when you play the game.