Sept. 16, 2009

University of Michigan senior catcher Chris Berset (Vienna, Va./Heights School) has spent the end of his summer and start of fall experiencing baseball overseas as part of the Great Britain National team participating in the 2009 Baseball World Cup.

Berset, whose grandparents hail from Great Britain and mother is full British, checked in recently with MGoBlue.com to let us know how things are going as he travels the globe to represent Great Britain and the University of Michigan.

Hello Everyone,

So here is a little run down of the past few days over here in Europe. We played Croatia (Sept. 12) knowing that we should beat them and that we needed a shut-out because the tiebreaker is runs allowed. Sure enough, the Croatian game was crazy. The crowd was crazy, and they were all yelling and screaming at us. It was definitely a hostile environment.

On the mound was a crafty legend of Croatia and he certainly knew how to pitch. After grounding out (very softly) on my first two at-bats, I finally made an adjustment in my third trip to the plate. On a 1-1 pitch, I blasted a two-run homer over the right field wall to put us up 3-0. It ended up being the winning runs.

I came up for my last at-bat righty -- don't forget I am a switch-hitter -- with a man on third and smashed a line drive right at the third baseman. He laid out completely to rob me. We held on to win the game, 4-1.

After the game, all of the Croatians were saying how good we were and they were extremely nice. We ended up watching the Germany vs. Venezuela game because we needed Germany to get destroyed by Venezuela so that we could move on. That is exactly what ended up happening! The win by Venezuela put us in as one of the top 16 teams in the world. So, our prize for this was to face Cuba (Sept. 13).

We left at 5 a.m. for Zagreb airport and flew on a charter plane to Amsterdam. We got in around 10:45 a.m., and after a short nap, we had to go get ready to play Cuba. Mind you, this is the same Cuban team that plays in the World Baseball Classic so this is the best of the best. Facing them was unreal; you just knew all of these guys could be MLB All-Stars.

The Cuban pitcher was nasty! He had a two-seamer about 90-91 with a slight cutter at 93. My first at-bat I battled to a full count before he threw me a changeup and I rocked it into right field. It was our first hit.

In my second at-bat of the game, I again found myself in a battle, working the count to full and fighting off a ton of pitches along the way. It led to a long at-bat and a walk. I was feeling pretty good so far with two really good trips to the dish.

My third trip up, he caught me off-guard and on a 0-1 pitch he came inside on me and I hit it hard down to first base for an easy out.

Cuba hit two home runs and had a 3-0 lead in the eighth inning which was totally crazy. We ended up losing 6-0 and the Cubans were very impressed. I am not sure if you know who Lazzo is but he is Cuba's famous closer and he was about to come in and close the door. Good thing he didn't have to, because I was definitely going yard against him! HA.

We had a quick turnaround to play South Korea (Sept. 14) in our next game and it was very windy. My first at-bat was another great one. This pitcher was possibly the best we have faced. He was throwing 92 to 93 with a nasty splitter and tight cutter. With a full count, I ripped a fastball up the middle to get our first hit again.

In my second at-bat, I just missed a fastball and he threw a nasty split (best I've ever seen) and I just missed it and I struck out.

My third at-bat I worked the count full and drew a great walk and my last time up, I faced a submarine pitcher who threw about 88-89 with nasty movement. I lost that battle and fouled a pitch into the catcher's mitt.

I threw out a base runner with a perfect throw and should have had a runner picked at second as well. Brant (former U-M volunteer assistant coach Brant Ust) blocked the bag perfectly but we did not get the call.

After playing five games in five days while traveling, we finally got our first off day. Now, we have five more games in five days and all against the best in the world. We will play Nicaragua (Sept. 16), Puerto Rico (Sept. 17), Netherlands (Sept. 18), Spain (Sept. 19) and Venezuela (Sept. 20). There are actually GameTracker (live stats) links available through the Baseball World Cup schedule page online, so you can check out how we are doing.

Well that's all for now but I will keep everyone posted on how we do in the upcoming games!

GO BLUE!

Chris Berset

• Baseball World Cup Info