Baseball Fever Rages as 2019 World Series Loops

FORT MYERS, Fla. — It’s easy to find the negatives associated with the World Baseball Classic. How it’s staged at the wrong time of the year and can be disruptive to the regular season.

How injuries can happen and cost players’ time with their own teams. How players seem to come and go from their teams and how some seem more interested in competing than others. But this spring, the WBC has been a gift, offering something to care about and watch, separate and apart from the sometimes drudgery of spring training.

There’s the sheer elation being shown by players in victory, with no one the least bit concerned about bat flips or expressions of joy. There’s the emergence of young stars on the international stage and the promise of more to come. There have been dramatic finishes and upsets – the kind you don’t experience if you spent a lifetime watching games in the Cactus League or Grapefruit League.

And to think: we haven’t even reached the semi-finals or the championship game. A lot of spring training games are stale. Stars are lifted after two at-bats and road teams barely field Triple-A-caliber lineups.