{"id":538416,"date":"2026-03-15T17:37:21","date_gmt":"2026-03-15T17:37:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/538416\/"},"modified":"2026-03-15T17:37:21","modified_gmt":"2026-03-15T17:37:21","slug":"michael-lorenzen-to-start-for-italy-keider-montero-for-venezuela-in-world-baseball-classic-semifinal","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/538416\/","title":{"rendered":"Michael Lorenzen to start for Italy, Keider Montero for Venezuela in World Baseball Classic semifinal"},"content":{"rendered":"

MIAMI (AP) \u2014 Michael Lorenzen<\/a> will start for Italy and Keider Montero<\/a> for Venezuela when the teams meet Monday night in a World Baseball Classic semifinal.<\/p>\n

A 34-year-old right-hander, Lorenzen pitched 4 2\/3 scoreless innings in the group stage 8-6 upset of the United States on Tuesday.<\/p>\n

\u201cI faced him many times,\u201d said Italy manager Francisco Cervelli, a former big league catcher. \u201cThis is the perfect guy.\u201d<\/p>\n

Italy is in the semifinals for the first time of a tournament that started in 2006. Venezuela lost its only semifinal appearance, 10-2 to South Korea in 2009.<\/p>\n

Lorenzen, an All-Star in 2023, was 7-11 with a 4.64 ERA in 26 starts and one relief appearances for Kansas City last year, then became a free agent and signed an $8 million, one-year contract with Colorado.<\/p>\n

If Italy wins, Aaron Nola<\/a> would be lined up to start Tuesday night\u2019s final against the U.S. or the Dominican Republic.<\/p>\n

Montero, a 25-year-old right-hander, pitched three scoreless innings of relief on Monday in a 4-0 first-round win over Nicaragua.<\/p>\n

He made his big league debut on May 29, 2024, and was 5-3 with a 4.37 ERA in 12 starts and eight relief appearances last year for Detroit during a season in which he was optioned to Triple-A Toledo six times. Monero was 4-4 with a 5.91 ERA in eight starts and two relief appearances for the Mud Hens.<\/p>\n

Montero had three postseason appearances last year and got a save in the AL Division Series opener, an 11-inning win over Cleveland.<\/p>\n

Italy made a pair of roster moves ahead of the semifinal: Left-hander Joe Jacques<\/a> replaced Dylan DeLucia, who threw 58 pitches in Saturday\u2019s quarterfinal win over Puerto Rico and under pitch-count rules is ineligible to take the mound on Monday. Infielder Brayan Rocchio<\/a> took the roster spot of Miles Mastrobuoni<\/a>, who got hurt in the game against the U.S.<\/p>\n

___<\/p>\n

AP MLB: https:\/\/apnews.com\/hub\/mlb<\/p>\n

Ronald Blum, The Associated Press<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"MIAMI (AP) \u2014 Michael Lorenzen will start for Italy and Keider Montero for Venezuela when the teams meet…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":538417,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[435],"tags":[49,48,462,82],"class_list":["post-538416","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\/538416","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=538416"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/538416\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/538417"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=538416"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=538416"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=538416"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}