Mark DeRosa doesn’t have much managing experience, and Miles Mikolas caught him in a bad moment during the World Baseball Classic.
Miles Mikolas is one of the best pitchers Team USA has to offer at this point in tournament, as plenty of aces turned down the opportunity to throw in the World Baseball Classic.
To be fair, the WBC is precariously placed just before Opening Day in the middle of spring training.
Still, despite injury concerns, Mark DeRosa was able to field a team of capable major-league pitchers. What DeRosa didn’t expect would be how tough it is to manage a bullpen when every member has certain restraints.
WBC: Miles Mikolas is frustrated with Mark DeRosa in funny moment
In the middle of Monday night’s win over Canada, Mikolas was called upon in the sixth frame. But first, he got loose in the third inning, only to not come in the game.
Mikolas then motioned to the bullpen coach that he wasn’t prepared to come into the game. This was merely meant to be his throw day in between starts. His next outing is supposed to be on Wednesday.
At one point he motioned to Dave Righetti and the scoreboard and said "there's no way I'm pitching tonight."
— Aaron Hill 🇲🇽⚾ (@AaronBaronHill) March 14, 2023
Team USA starter Lance Lynn survived five innings and 65 pitches, which is when the bullpen phone rang again. Mikolas was up next, and had to restart his throwing motion and pitch on short rest, prior to his next start. Talk about messing with someone’s rhythm.
Mikolas appeared fine in his outing despite the frequents ups and downs in warmups.
DeRosa’s first real managerial gig isn’t going according to plan — and that’s fine on a team this talented. The most important thing is that he stays the course and follows the load management plan for all the players on this roster.
Ideally, next time around, he’ll have more to work with.