Venezuela a no-show

Baseball Canada’s president called Venezuela’s 11th-hour withdrawal from the World Junior Baseball Championship an embarrassment to the game.

Ray Carter said he plans to ask International Baseball Federation president Riccardo Fraccari – who arrives Saturday – to levy penalties and/or fines on the Venezuelan Baseball Federation, which has yet to provide the IBAF or Baseball Canada with a satisfactory explanation as to why they’ve pulled out of the 10-day tournament the day before it’s set to begin.

“I will be talking to him as we start process to eliminate this from happening again,” Carter told a pre-tournament news conference on Thursday night as the other 11 teams settled into Thunder Bay life.

“As members of the IBAF this is not good. It’s embarrassing ... and we need to talk about how we can eliminate this from future tournaments down the road.”

IBAF officials said they couldn’t really give an explanation why the Venezuelans won’t be in Thunder Bay, only that for the past six days the South American qualifier had told them they were plagued with visa issues.

It’s the timing that had George Santiago, head of the world governing body’s technical commission, upset. Venezuela qualified for the tournament a year ago and had plenty of time to get their house in order, Santiago said.

“It should have been taken care awhile ago,” he said. “We reached out to them, and these were the answers we were given.”

IBAF official Ian Young said they’ve known about a potential problem for several days, and have worked around the clock to fix it, but to no avail.

“We’ve been in constant communication to see if we could final solution,” he said.

The result is that each of the Venezuelan’s five scheduled Pool A games will automatically be forfeited to their opponent, who will be credited with a 9-0 win.

A total of seven games, including round-robin affairs against Australia, the United States, France and Italy, plus a pair of playoff games, will be erased from the schedule.

But crowds won’t lose out, said organizers, who will allow fans to exchange tickets for Venezuela games for other equally or lower-priced games throughout the week. And officials, who met Thursday afternoon to discuss possible alternatives, have devised a way to get the scheduled opposition on the field during game time.

Instead of playing, those teams will take part in an extended practice session, possibly interacting with fans, signing autographs and perhaps even hosting impromptu interactive hitting and fielding clinics.

The Australians, who were delayed two days getting to Thunder Bay after a 35-hour flight, were slated to take on Venezuela on Friday afternoon and will try to make the best of the situation, said manager Tony Harris.

He added none of the teams came to Thunder Bay looking for a forfeit triumph.

“That’s not how we want to win games. It’s disappointing that Venezuela pulled out as late as they did, for whatever reason. I have no idea. But we’ve got to move forward on that and we just look forward to the games that we’re playing with the teams that are here,” Harris said.

Harris is of mixed opinion about the situation, knowing his team needs rest, but anxious to get onto the field.

“We were meant to play some lead-up games with the Netherlands, which we couldn’t, because we only got in last night, so it probably helps us with acclimation a little bit. (But) it’s nice to get under way as soon as you can. So it’s a bit of a 50-50 there. That being said, we’ve just got to look forward to the next game, which is the U.S.A. for us.”

Garye LaFevers, manager of the U.S. entry, said he hasn’t paid much attention to global politics – it was suggested by one coach that perhaps Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez was playing politics and didn’t allow the team to leave the country – but he sees no logical explanation why the Venezuelans aren’t in Thunder Bay readying themselves for opening day.

“You would think when they have nine months to get everything lined up that all the paperwork that needs to be taken care of would be taken care of. But you’re not there to understand what’s going on either. So from our standpoint it’s a disappointment, it’s an unexpected day off for us, but we’ll just handle it the best way we can, like everybody else will,” LaFevers said.

The U.S. was scheduled to play Venezuela on Tuesday.

World views: Tournament organizer Warren Philp announced Thursday that Rogers Sportsnet will be in Thunder Bay televising the final four games of the WJBC – both semifinals and the gold- and bronze-medal games ... The Australian pitching coach is former Major Leaguer Graeme Lloyd. Paul Quantrill, a veteran of 841 MLB games, holds a similar role for the Canadians, while Brian McRae, who spent 10 years in the Majors, is a coach for the Americans.