.jpg)
1 hour ago
2
If the United States and Venezuela meet in the World Baseball Classic championship game on Tuesday night, a coin toss will be needed.
One of the teams has to be the home team, batting second in each inning. And in this case, that'll get determined by a coin flip.
If Italy won Monday's semifinal, the Italians would be the home team. They'd have a 6-0 record, relative to the U.S. at 5-1, which would determine home field with no further tiebreaker needed.
If Venezuela advances, though, they'll match Team USA with a 5-1 record.
And in that case in this tournament, a coin flip makes the decision.
"A coin flip between the two teams would determine home field, and the U.S. would get to make the heads or tails call on the flip based on the World Baseball Softball Confederation rankings from the start of the 2026 tournament," writes MLB.com's Anthony Castrovince. "Note that neither Venezuela nor Team USA won its pool. But even if one of the two teams had won its pool, it wouldn’t matter because their overall records in the tournament were identical. A coin flip would still have been necessary in that scenario."
MORE: Mason Miller is on an unbelievable 272-pitch streak
This isn't something you see all that often.
MLB used to have this for its own postseason, but they eventually instituted a lengthy list of mathematical tiebreakers that prevents there from being all-out ties in the standings anymore.
The WBC doesn't have the same thing at play in this circumstance, though.
And so if it's USA-Venezuela, a coin will be determine which team could get a chance to walk the game off if it's tied in the ninth inning.
English (US)