Day 2 of the World Baseball Classic includes the start of games in Pool B and the continuation of games in Pool A. The first game of the night is Australia facing Korea, which begins at 10:00 pm ET on FS1. Earlier this morning, Panama crushed Chinese Taipei by a score of 12-5. Anybody watching that game probably had the same two thoughts: Are the air horns ever going to stop? And why isn’t there a pitch clock? Any time there is a Latin American team playing, you can expect air horns to be a constant theme of the game. And unfortunately, there is no pitch clock, but it would have been nice in this morning’s game which took over 4 hours.
I started the WBC on the right foot yesterday with my Netherlands +1.5 pick winning with ease, and here’s my World Baseball Classic Day 2 best bet.
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Australia vs Korea Predictions World Baseball Classic 2023: Korea -2.5 (-140)
Available at DraftKings Sportsbook at time of publishing
The Korean players have been very polite when the media has asked them about their game against Australia. They declined to talk about future games, even though they are a massive favorite over the Aussies, and will take every game one step at a time. But in all honesty, this should be a blowout. Korea has announced they will start Young Pyo Ko, a right-handed pitcher who is one of the two aces for the KBO’s KT Wiz. The Wiz are one of the KBO’s premier teams, and Ko is one of their best pitchers. He had a 3.26 ERA with a 1.17 WHIP during his 28 starts in the 2022 KBO season. The 31-year-old is exactly the type of pitcher every manager wants, as he is incredibly accurate and rarely gives up extra-base hits. In the 2022 KBO season, he allowed just 23 walks and 7 home runs in 182.1 innings.
In their first game of the tournament, Australia will hand the ball to Jack O’Loughlin, a 22-year-old lefty pitcher. O’Loughlin started his professional baseball career at 16 years old in the Australian Baseball League before traveling to the United States to play a few seasons in the Minors. The lefty never made it past High-A and returned to Australia for the 2022 season. The report on him is simple: it’s strikeout or bust. And when I mean bust — I mean walk. In the Minors, he averaged 4 walks per 9 innings and over 8 strikeouts per 9 innings. That strategy won’t work well against a Korean team that will put the ball in play constantly and not go down on strikes often. Korea is a huge favorite in this game, so I’m backing their alternate run line to maximize the value, as I think this game will get away from the Aussies fast.
Check out my World Baseball Classic preview for team analysis and best bets
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