The 2013 Major League Baseball season hasn’t even started yet, but it has its work cut out for it, thanks to the World Baseball Classic. Last Saturday, Canada and Mexico faced off in a first round game of the D pool at Chase Field in Phoenix, and Canada’s merry band of hosers walked away with a 10-3 victory. No big deal, right? Wrong.

In the 9th inning of the game, with Canada up 9-3, Mexico’s pitcher Arnold Leon didn’t quite care that his allies to the north were paying attention to the WBC rules and trying to put up as many runs as possible. Instead, Leon pitched inside on Rene Tosoni, which drew a warning from the umpire, and Leon followed that up by drilling Tosoni in the middle of his back. What resulted was a bench-clearing brawl that would have made the New York Yankees and Boston Red Sox blush.

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The World Baseball Classic crowned its champion last night as Japan beat Korea, 5-3, in 10 innings. And it was a damn good game, featuring fantastic defensive play and incredible hustle from both teams. It was weird watching a game where the players actually try (I’m looking at you, Adam Dunn).

This tournament seemingly has been a huge hit everywhere across the globe–except here in the states. As the Japanese and Korean teams successfully loaded their clubs with their best players, players who were honored to go and relished the experience. The American side, conversely, endured squabbles with players more concerned about getting prepared for the long MLB season, and that’s totally fair. That’s where their bread gets buttered. But if Selig wants this thing to catch on in America, he’ll have to act similarly to the NHL and suspend the season to get his best players–in top form–in the tournament.

But omedetou to the Japanese team. And let’s add “baseball” to “electronics manufacturing” and “long division” to the list of things that the Far East does better than America. We’re not quite as perverted as the Japanese are, either, but I’m still optimistic about that.

For the first time ever, Derek Jeter will play against the New York Yankees tomorrow.

As a member of the United States team for the World Baseball Classic, Jeter will play against the Yankees for the first time in an exhibition game at Steinbrenner Field in Tampa.

“I haven’t really thought about it that way,” Jeter said. “It will probably feel like an intrasquad game.”

The game is a warm-up for the second W.B.C., which begins Thursday and ends March 23. Jeter played in the first Classic, in 2006, but not against the Yankees.

Not everyone is jumping out of their MLB duds to don uniforms of their own nationalities. Dominican Albert Pujols will not be playing for his homeland, and would have considered playing against either the DR team or his Cardinals team “disrespectful.” And tomorrow, I’ll be playing with myself. I see nothing disrespectful about that.

ASYLUM POLL: Should WBC Country Allegiances Trump Team Allegiances?