Mazzieri: “We can get on that mountain in LA…”
Prior to the first official Team Italy workout in Mesa, Arizona, manager Marco Mazzieri delivered a heartfelt, emotional and uplifting speech to his players, coaches and staff:
"This is great guys. We have been waiting a long time. Just get comfortable. I won’t bother you too much. I have three or four points I would like to share with you. Number one…we have a couple birthdays to celebrate today…Luis Lugo (March 5) and Francisco Cervelli. Happy Birthday guys (round of applause and cheers). What a way to celebrate wearing the Azzurri jersey.
Number two…I want you guys to meet all the staff I have brought together. There has been incredible work performed by all these people. Number three…I need to get across this inspirational message to you, and I want to share it with you. I want to start by thanking you guys. Thank you for joining Team Italy. Some of you had to leave Major League camps. Some of you had to leave Minor League camps. Some of you had to take time off your regular job and that’s not easy to do as well. So we really deeply appreciate you for coming out. By being here, you show us how determined you are to be here and that’s what we are looking for.
Great moments arise from great opportunities. You guys have a great opportunity to turn the time you put into this into some great moments. It’s not going to get any better than this. I began my journey with the Italian national team in 2007, and I had a vision. I had a vision of competing and winning against the best team in the world. Convincing my guys that we could do it, one single game, we could beat anybody. Maybe we got lucky that time…we have a few guys here who were actually on that team in 2007. Probably most of you don’t know it, but we beat USA. Team USA ended up winning the 2007 World Cup with one loss to us. I know you guys don’t know it or maybe don’t believe it, but it’s in the book. They had Longoria, Rasmus and some great players and Alessandro Maestri closed out that game. So it was great. In 2009 we went to the World Baseball Classic. Nobody expected anything from Team Italy, and we did the unexpected. We beat Team Canada. Just to find out we went back to the hotel we had no hotel rooms because nobody expected us. So Canada had to leave and we had to go into their rooms. In the 2013 World Baseball Classic, we are the underdogs again…fine we’ll take that. We like that! We beat Mexico and Canada. We went to the second round down in Miami. We had Dominican Republic and Puerto Rico on the ropes…I think everybody knows this. We shocked the world. We still remember that. I get goose bumps every time I think about it. We shocked the world. Some of you were there…right. You remember. We shocked the world.
Now it’s the 2017 World Baseball Classic. We feel we have the right guys to go even further. We started climbing that mountain back in 2009. We went even a little further and higher in 2013. Now I know and see…and I want you guys to know and see if you close your eyes that we can get on that mountain in LA and plant that Italian flag there (applause). We can do it. We can do it! This is how I feel…we will have to play to win every single pitch of this tournament. That’s how we are going to do it. Every single pitch, every single at-bat, every single play will be magnified. That’s the just of it. It’s a great feeling, just enjoy it because this is different to play with this Azzurri jersey on. The Italia jersey is different. We were talking with Franky (Frank Catalanotto) and Nick (Punto) last night and to play the first time with this jersey on…it’s not the same. You can feel it…it gets heavy on you the first time. So make sure we will be calm in the storm. Make sure you are poised under pressure. The first game we are going to have 20,000 people screaming against us, screaming against us! Don’t expect someone to give us something. They are not going to give it to us. We have got to go and get it. The next games will be the same. For some reason, you know, if Team Italy advances…maybe it’s not what everybody wants but we know that. We experienced this four years ago. So I know you understand. Maybe you know or heard about Mount Everest. It’s the highest mountain in the world. So we started that journey, little by little we climbed up a little bit. In 2009 we climbed a little more. In 2013 again we climbed even more. I think we have the guys to get us up there. And up there…there’s a great view guys. The air is thin and the view you get from up there is beautiful. There has been a lot of talking for the last three or four months. We will let the other teams do the talking, and we are going to let success make all the noise for us. Make it happen guys! (applause)"
by Roberto Angotti
