By: The “Dean” Ira Jaskoll

The big news in the world of sports is the World Baseball Classic that is happening in Miami, Houston, Tokyo and San Juan. Twenty teams are competing in the WBC with Israel back for the third time. In 2023 they won one game against Nicaragua to qualify for this year’s event while in 2017 they won three games to qualify defeating Great Britain twice and Brazil. I attended two of those games at the Brooklyn Cyclones Stadium. Super exciting. They then went onto the WBC and were the Cinderella Team going 4-0 by defeating South Korea, Chinese Taipei, Netherlands and Cuba. That qualified them for the second round in Japan where they lost to the Netherlands and Japan.

This year’s team is managed by Brad Ausmus, Bench Coach of the NY Yankees and former manager of the Detroit Tigers and LA Dodgers. Outfielder Assaf Lowengart was born in Israel and pitcher Dean Kremer of the Baltimore Orioles parents are Israeli’s. Former Yankees on the team are pitcher Tommy Kahnle and outfielder Harrison Bader. Rob Kaminsky comes from Englewood Cliffs, NJ and attended Solomon Schechter Day School of Bergen County. Coaching for the team are Kevin Youkilis, former Yankee and Red Sox, Nate Fish, CEO of Team Israel in the USA and Jason Agresti, the latter two I know personally. Jason, is a catcher and played for the Sussex Miners minor league baseball team, made Aliyah and is a member of the 2028 Olympic Baseball Team.

Highlights of the 5-0 win
Israel scored one run in the first inning on Noah Mendlinger’s single. Dean Kremer, who has played in all three of Isreal’s WBC Tournaments, threw four shutout innings retiring 12 out of 13 batters. Josh Mallitz came in the fourth inning and with bases loaded got Freddy Zamora to hit to Jake Gelof at third for an inning ending double play. In the fifth inning, Zach Levenson drove in two runs, Harrison Bader, who made a great sliding catch in center field, knocked in another run and Cole Carrigg, the speedster, also knocked in a run to close out Israel’s first shutout in the World Baseball Classic. Next up is the Dominican Republic at 12pm EDT.

Rabbi Ira Jaskoll received Semicha from RIETS of Yeshiva University. He is the former Associate Dean of the Sy Syms School of Business of YU. He teaches Sports Management courses at Touro University where he also was the founding coach of the Touro Baseball Team. He has played in five NY Yankees Fantasy Camps in Tampa, FL and won in 2023 the B Championship. He won a Bronze Medal in Masters Basketball at the 1999 Pan American Maccabia Games in Mexico City, Mexico.