Japan vs USA
August 2, 2021 7:00 am EDT
The United States and Japan face off on Monday morning in a round 2 Olympic baseball showdown. Both the United States and Japan have won each of their first two games of the Olympics.
The United States has a whole lot of confidence heading into this tournament as they have already beaten South Korea and Israel. In the first game, the United States won 4-2 against South Korea and in the last game against Israel, they looked even better winning 8-1. Tyler Austin has been the start of this USA baseball team so far, and in the last game he had two hits and drove in three runs. The most surprising part for this United States team has probably been the pitching. There were a lot of question marks about this pitching staff, but they have stepped up and found a lot of success.
On the other side of this matchup is Japan who opened up its Olympics with a 7-4 win over Mexico, and in the second game, they beat the Dominican Republic 4-3. Munetaka Murakami has been the best player for Japan in these Olympics and in the last game he drove in two RBI’s. This is a team that has a lot of talent all over the field, but especially with their pitching. In this game, if they want to come away with the victory and slow down the United States, it’s going to need to be the pitching that is the difference.
The United States has been playing well and I think that continues in this game. Look for the USA offense to be strong early, and they are going to keep their perfect Olympics going with a win over Japan.
