The Tribune

By BRENT STUBBS

Senior Sports Reporter

bstubbs@tribunemedia.net

Since they have been invited to be a part of Great Britain’s team, former player turned coach Albert Cartwright said he likes the way the Bahamian players have responded to the challenge.

Great Britain is preparing to play in the World Baseball Classic, starting this weekend at Chase Field in Phoenix, the home of the Diamondbacks, with seven players and two coaches making up the line-up. Cartwright and Antoan Richardson, who were the first two to play for Great Britain, are back as coaches.

Joining the Bahamian connection on Great Britain’s team are Chavez Fernander from the Detroit Tigers and Tahnaj Thomas of the Pittsburgh Pirates as pitchers, Ural Forbes as a catcher, Lucius Fox of the Washington Nationals and BJ Murray from the Chicago Cubs as infielders and D’Shawn Knowles of the Los Angeles Angels, Anfernee Seymour, Trayce Thompson of the Los Angeles Dodgers and Chavez Young of the Toronto Blue Jays as outfielders.

“Everything is looking good. Today will be the first day that all of the guys will be here,” said Cartwright, the first base coach on the team. “In the next few days we will play some exhibition games to see exactly where we stand as we move forward.

“I think we are looking good. We have some young guys who are eager to play this game, so I think we should be able to compete.”

Richardson, the sixth Bahamian to play in Major League Baseball and now the first base coach for the San Francisco Giants, said as the bench coach for Great Britain, he will work directly with the manager.

“I am here to help lend my expertise and experience in the decision-making process and be a support base for our local players on the team,” Richardson said. “I’m just looking forward to competing with this team. It’s been a while since I had the opportunity to interact with them.

“We have Albert and myself on the coaching staff and there are about seven players on the tram. So it’s really exciting and the ability to compete together is something that I’m really looking forward to doing.”

In 2016, the Bahamas sent nine players to represent Great Britain. Cartwright said they were looking to match or surpass that number this year, but a few of the players didn’t get cleared from their respective baseball organisations to compete, including Jasrado ‘Jazz’ Chisholm of the Miami Marlins.

Cartwright and Richardson, who will be the bench coaches, were the first two to suit up for Great Britain in 2012. They also played again in 2016. Ever since, they have been able to add more players to the roster.

“At the start of the programme in 2012, it was rough,” Cartwright said. “But now to see where it is and we are actually playing in the tournament every year, it’s a lot of fun. I was there from when they first invited guys outside of the UK. So I’m glad that they allowed me and Antoan to continue the journey as coaches.”

There’s been a whole lot of talk about trying to get the Bahamas to field its own team to participate in the tournament. But Cartwright said the Bahamas isn’t quite ready to make that jump just yet. “I know our federation is trying to get a team to go to the qualifier to see how well we can do,” Cartwright said.

“But it’s going to take some time for the guys to do what they have to do, but it’s going to take more as they trust the federation to do its part.

“They want to see how well the federation can do to make it easy for them to play the game, but I think they are on the right track to play in a qualifier. I think we have the position players to compete. We are lacking pitching of course. That is our Achilles’ heal, but we will have to figure out how we can get around that.”

In the World Baseball Classic, Cartwright said teams will need an abundance of pitchers because they won’t allow one pitcher to pitch an entire game. He noted that a pitcher has a limit of about 65 pitches before he’s not eligible to continue to play.

“You need 16-17 pitchers on the roster, so it’s something that our federation is looking into so that we can go to a qualifier in the few years so that we can see where we are and what we need to do to play at this level,” Cartwright stated.

Great Britain played an exhibition game on Sunday with half of their squad against the Los Angeles Dodgers’ minor league team. Included in their line-up were Seymour and Forbes.

On Wednesday, March 8 and Thursday, March 9, Great Britain will face the Milwaukee Brewers and the Kansas City Royals respectively.

“We re looking pretty good,” Cartwright said. “Our boys are really excited about playing.”

Great Britain will take on the United States in their opening match on Saturday, March 11.

Sanctioned by the World Baseball Softball Confederation (WBSC), the World Baseball Classic is the sport’s official National Team World Championships.