After Venezuela starting pitcher Ranger Suarez gave up the five runs to Japan on three hits and three walks in just 2.2 innings, their bullpen would throw a four-hit shutout the rest of the way. Out of the 17 hits in the game, 11 were for extra-base hits (doubles, triples, home runs), with seven of them coming from the Venezuela bats.
Venezuela will now be taking on Italy, the Cinderella story of the 2026 WBC, after they took down Puerto Rico 8-6. The winner between them will face the winner of the other semi-finals game between the Dominican Republic and the United States.
Venezuela advances to the World Baseball Classic semi-finals for just the second time in the country's history, the first being in 2009 when they lost 10-3 to South Korea, after
Closer Daniel Palencia would force Shohei Ohtani to fly out for the final out of the game.
Recap and highlights
Venezuela's Ronald Acuna Jr. made his comeback from injury during last year's MLB season. And in the first pitch he saw, he moonshotted a home run.
Well, in this game, Acuna sent the second pitch he saw out of the yard off Japan starter Yoshinobu Yamamoto to put Venezuela up 1-0.
But it didn't take long for Japan to get on the board. And to nobody's surprise, it was the four-time MLB MVP Award winner who was the cause of it.
Ohtani launched a solo shot himself to tie the game back up 1-1 in the bottom of the first inning, proving that the fans were in for pure baseball cinema the rest of the way.
Venezuela would keep the solo-run train going in the top of the second inning.
Ezequiel Tovar would get on board with a leadoff double, before Gleyber Torres would bring him home with a no-out double himself off the left field wall to take the 2-1 lead over Japan.
But Yamamoto would get himself out of the jam, recording three straight outs after allowing his only walk. He would finish the game after four innings, giving up two runs on four hits with five strikeouts.
Japan would go 1-2-3 in the bottom of the second inning, leaving Venezuela to open off the top of the third with a Maikel Garcia lead-off double before Yamamoto would retire the rest of the side without problem.
Then, Japan's bats were on fire in Miami.
They'd start off the inning with a walk to Sosuke Genda and a sac-bunt from Kenya Wakatsuki to advance him to second, while being thrown out at first. Suarez would intentionally walk Ohtani to put the double-play possibility into effect, but it wouldn't matter.
Teruaki Sato would hit his third double of the WBC to bring in Genda from second, advancing Ohtani to third with one out to make it 2-2.
Then, in the next at-bat, Shota Morishita would launch a three-run home run, also his first of the WBC, to put Japan up 5-2.
Kazuma Okamoto would double off Venezuela relief pitcher Eduard Bazardo before he got out of the inning to minimize any further damage from the Japanese bats.
Both teams would go through a scoreless fifth inning, including Venezuela getting out of a jam that saw Ohtani up to bat with runners on first and second with one out.
Enmanuel De Jesus would strike both him and Sato out to end the inning, leading to a fifth inning where Venezuela showed they weren't going away.
After a Jackson Chourio walk and an Acuna strikeout, Garcia would send one into the stands to cut the lead to 5-4.
The Venezuelan bats weren't done by any means. After forcing Japan into a 1-2-3 bottom of the fifth inning, Venezuela would retake the lead in the top of the sixth.
After Ezequiel Tovar and Torres hit a pair of singles with no outs, Wilyer Abreau, who made his World Baseball Classic debut, would send a moonshot into the right field upper deck that would put Venezuela up 7-5, completely shifting the momentum with just three more innings to go.
Two innings later, Tovar would get on base again as he reached on a lead-off double that would eventually turn into Venezuela's eighth run of the game.
On a wild pitch to second, Tovar would round third and pull up at home to extend their lead to 8-5.
Japan had 13 batters retired in a row until Kazuma Okamoto broke that hitless streak in the bottom of the eighth inning. His teammate Munetaka Murakami would follow up with a single of his own to put batters on first and second with two outs.
But Venezuela's Andres Machado would force Shugo Maki into a groundout to send the game into the final inning, where Japan couldn't get anything going as they went on to officially be eliminated after winning the tournament in 2023.
