Baseball: Down to final four in World Classic

Cuba's starting pitcher Maya Yuneski leaves the mound despondent during yesterday's loss to Japan. Photo / AP

The final four teams have been found at the World Baseball Classic.

Team USA, Venezuela, Japan and South Korea will battle it out in the semifinals, which will be played at Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles on the weekend.

The two semifinal matchups will be determined by the outcome of the final Pool game between Japan and South Korea today.

Hometown favourites, Team USA, got this far thanks to a heart-stopping rally in the bottom of the 9th inning of their elimination game against Puerto Rico.

Trailing 5-3 and down to their last three at-bats, USA scored 3 runs to snatch a dramatic 6-5 win and stay alive in the championships.

The big surprise so far in the tournament has been the failure of Cuba, a nation that has always gone deep into world championship events in the past.

Japan eliminated the out-of-sorts Cubans 5-0 yesterday.

The other surprising feature about the tournament has been the disappointingly small crowds.

For example, San Diego's Petco Park has been the venue for recent pool games in Round 2.

The crowds aren't showing up, and their absence is embarrassingly noticeable in vast arenas such as Petco, and Miami's Dolphin Stadium.

In Tuesday's vital elimination game between Mexico and Cuba the stands were virtually empty. An estimated five to seven thousand fans showed up.

Huh? Mexico is just over the border from San Diego. There are more Mexicans in southern California than anywhere else on the planet. Yet only a handful came out to support their team?

It's hard to figure out why.

The low attendances may be another indicator of the poor US economy at the moment.

Prices in the non-premium zones of the stand range from US$35 to US$50 a seat - hardly exorbitant, especially compared to the Major League Baseball ticket prices fans are used to, when the professional teams play.

World Baseball Classic ambassador and baseball legend Tommy Lasorda was at the game. Lasorda told San Diego 6 News: "There should be more people coming out to this ballpark.

"With Mexico playing, I thought 'by golly, we should have a big crowd,'" said a bemused Lasorda.

Dubbed "the world's premier international baseball tournament" by organisers, the World Baseball Classic is actually an invitational event.

A number of the game's leading all-stars have chosen to attend Major League spring training as usual, rather than compete in this "world championship".