HOUSTON (AP) \u2014 J.J. D\u2019Orazio doubled with three RBIs and Andrew Fischer drove in two runs as Italy kept up its charmed World Baseball Classic run with an 8-6 win over Puerto Rico on Saturday to earn its first trip to the semifinals.<\/p>\n
The Azzurri improved to 5-0 in the tournament and advanced to face defending champion Japan or Venezuela on Monday night in Miami.<\/p>\n
Italy trailed only briefly after a leadoff home run by Willi Castro<\/a> before scoring four runs in the first inning to go on top for good. Puerto Rico rallied late, scoring four runs in the eighth, but Greg Weissert<\/a> allowed one hit in a scoreless ninth for a five-out save. <\/p>\n Puerto Rico, in the quarterfinals for a sixth time, fell to 1-2 against Italy in the WBC.<\/p>\n Italy was up by two in the fourth when it drew three straight walks that loaded the bases with two outs. Fischer hit a ball to right field that a fan reached over the fence to catch, and Fischer was credited with a double on fan interference for a 6-2 lead. D\u2019Orazio followed with a two-run, ground-rule double.<\/p>\n Eddie Rosario<\/a> hit into a run-scoring forceout in the eighth, Joe La Sorsa<\/a> threw a run-scoring wild pitch and Christian V\u00e1zquez hit a two-run single. Weissert allowed a two-out single before retiring Nolan Arenado<\/a> on an inning-ending groundout.<\/p>\n Castro\u2019s shot to the Crawford Boxes in left field on winner Sam Aldegheri<\/a>\u2019s fourth pitch put Puerto Rico, its second home run of the tournament.<\/p>\n Vinnie Pasquantino<\/a>, who set a WBC record with three homers in Italy\u2019s previous game, hit a tying single in the bottom half, and RBI singles by Dominic Canzone<\/a> and Jac Caglianone<\/a> chased loser Seth Lugo<\/a>. D\u2019Orazio hit a sacrifice fly off Jovani Mor\u00e1n.<\/p>\n Aldegheri walked two batters with one out in the second and hit Matthew Lugo<\/a> on the top of a foot with a pitch. Alek Jacob<\/a> forced in a run when he entered with the bases loaded and plunked Martin Maldonado<\/a> with his first pitch.<\/p>\n ___<\/p>\n AP MLB: https:\/\/apnews.com\/hub\/mlb<\/p>\n Kristie Rieken, The Associated Press<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"HOUSTON (AP) \u2014 J.J. D\u2019Orazio doubled with three RBIs and Andrew Fischer drove in two runs as Italy…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":536848,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[435],"tags":[49,48,462,82],"class_list":["post-536847","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mlb","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-mlb","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/536847","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=536847"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/536847\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/536848"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=536847"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=536847"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=536847"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}