WORLD BASEBALL CLASSIC: QUARTERFINALS - ITALY VS JAPAN

March 16, 2023

Mike Piazza

Tokyo Dome

Team Italy

Postgame Press Conference

Japan 9, Italy 3

Q. What are your thoughts on being defeated by Japan?

MIKE PIAZZA: Against a very good team, you have to be exceptional. Obviously tonight, we weren't. We didn't throw the ball well tonight. We needed our pitchers to have a very good game. And unfortunately they just didn't. We threw hard and battled but against a team like Japan, you can't make those mistakes. We had eight walks, six walks -- eight walk, yeah. You're not -- it's just baseball. You're not going to beat a team like Japan, eight walks.

We got a couple balls, a couple great plays. We still just weren't able to -- it was just a tough night for us. But again, our pitching was great in the last series it. Was a tough night and that's part of baseball.

During the season, you know, you just chalk it up and say that's part of baseball but in a tournament like this, you can't afford a bad night, but those guys battled and I'm proud of this team. I think these guys work hard.

We knew this was probably going to be the toughest game of the tournament. We felt like if we would have won this game we probably would have a good shot of winning the whole tournament because of the difficulty of this game but it is what it is and we wish Japan well in Miami, my hometown, so I hope they have a good series.

Q. You faced against Japan and I guess you had a Japanese scouting report. Is there any difference in the gap from before the game started and after the game started, any gap in between?

MIKE PIAZZA: I think scouting reports only work if you put yourself in a position to take advantage and as I've said before, there's two things you can't defense: You can't defense a walk and you can't defense an error. That's part of baseball.

So these things have to work together to be effective. Again, I think it's just that's the game. That's part of baseball. In this tournament, you can't have a tough night. From the beginning, we were scrambling a little bit and trying to get to the middle innings, get through those innings and it just seemed like they had the big home run there and that really put us in a difficult position. That's, again, that's the game and we scratched back.

These guys never died, so we will go away from this with a positive experience and hope to build momentum for the next Classic. But it was a great experience and great to see Roberto, one of our Italian players, get in the game and get a base hit. That was a great experience for him and again he's going to inspire other Italian players to grow and mature.

Q. You faced Ohtani and Yu Darvish, and your offense scored three runs, including a solo shot by Fletcher. How do you evaluate your offense, because you scored three off of Japan's tough pitchers.

MIKE PIAZZA: Yeah, I thought Ohtani threw the ball well. Threw hard. And again, we had a couple good at-bats. As you said we had a couple clutch hits and then the home run.

But yeah, as I mentioned, it's difficult when you get down early because you really need good things to happen. You need some luck, as well. I think we popped up with some runners on, and you know, we weren't able to push that run across to build momentum. It just seemed like we couldn't really -- good bat here, a walk, a clutch hit, and then, you know, an out, I think a double play in the seventh or sixth inning as well, and that's a momentum killer. You need momentum to come back from a deficit like that. You need two or three hits, a walk and then maybe a big hit and then --that's what you need. But again, that's putting ourselves in a hole which is difficult. You can -- it happens once into while but not against a team like Japan. It's just a very difficult task to come back like that.

We had some good at-bats and hopefully we'll take a positive experience away from this tournament.

Q. Your first time ever to qualify in the quarterfinal for team Italy. What does that mean, advancing to the quarterfinal for the first time?

MIKE PIAZZA: I think it's a tribute to our preparation, our coaches. We were able to put a good team together and we had some last-minute changes, as well, in a tournament like this that you're not always going to assume that players can play. But we were fortunate that we were able to research players that were eligible and reach out to them and I think this is a good -- this is good for baseball, a team like this to do well, and I think it will be inspiring for Italian players to continue to get to higher levels.

And that's the plan. We didn't do this just to play the tournament and come out here to have a good time and travel a little bit. This is a movement we want to try to encourage to grow the game worldwide. There's a purpose to this. It's not just a one-off thing for us. We want to keep this momentum going, and prove -- we had some good games with the Dutch. Obviously the Czech Republic did well here, and I think we want to make Europe a good market for baseball, and it's a good start.

Q. When the stadium announced your name, there was a huge ovation. How did it feel, playing in front of the Japanese audience?

MIKE PIAZZA: Well, I was very honored with the reception. I saw some Japanese fans on the street, and they still remember myself catching Hideo Nomo for his first major league victory. Hideo has always been very gracious to me, expressing his appreciation for helping him adjust to the major leagues. I said, I think on the first day here, that I'm very honored that people still remember that, so I think that's a good thing.

Japan has always been very good to me, so I'm very honored and very happy and I actually am looking forward to coming back as a tourist with my family who is very interested in coming back to Japan. So it's good to be back. I'm glad things are better after the pandemic, and I look forward to coming back as a tourist hopefully soon.

Q. Talking about the roster, there are some pieces you wish you could have on the roster but you couldn't. Other than the roster, is there a difficult point for the manager, having like a team playing in an international match?

MIKE PIAZZA: Well, I mean, a tournament like this is always a challenge with the roster. But I'm very happy with the roster that we have, the guys that we took here. They did a great job and they played together as a team very quickly. And so they showed some character.

And of course, managing a tournament like this is difficult with the pitch counts, and as you've seen from this game tonight, when you have your starter get a little bit in trouble and then we're sort of behind in a difficult situation, it's tough to manage because right away we have a plan that we hope guys get a certain amount of innings, a certain amount of pitches, a certain amount outs, and so when you run into some trouble it kind of changes the order, and we have to scramble a little bit, and try to plug in and it changes our strategy.

But with that said, everybody, our guys that we put in did what we asked of them, and it's a difficult situation against a very good team. Again, I want to reiterate how good Japan was. The team is a good team.

As I said, against a good team, you have to be exceptional and unfortunately we weren't tonight.

Q. You had a very challenging shift on the defense. What does it mean? And Ohtani's second at-bat, he got a base hit.

MIKE PIAZZA: Didn't he bunt tonight? That was a surprise. Yeah, so it seems like he was trying to do something different. I was like, yeah, I thought he bunted.

Yeah, look, he's obviously a great hitter and maybe he wanted to try something different, try to get his offense going a little bit. But yeah, he's an exciting player and he's tough to play. He's tough to defense because he's got power, but our staff made some good pitches on him tonight.

So the greatest players still make outs. I think he had that one hit. I think he had that line drive, I believe in the first inning. The ball was hit hard but was a great play. It's very impressive, like I said before, a guy like that who can pitch at a high, high level and be a productive major league hitter. It's a once-in-a-lifetime player. You just don't see that. I've seen pitchers that are good hitter but obviously not in the context, not in the way he does. It's very impressive.