A former Wayland Baptist baseball player recently took the stage for his native country in one of the premiere baseball events in the world.
Tom Bailey, a hard-throwing right-handed pitcher for the Pioneers from 2012-14, represented Australia in the World Baseball Classic, the biggest tournament in international baseball circles played once every four years.
"It's hard to put this experience into words," Bailey said. "It was a very honorable experience."
Bailey graduated from Wayland with a Bachelor of Science degree, having majored in sports medicine. He returned home to Perth, Australia, after being offered a professional contract to pitch for the Perth Heat in the Australian Baseball League.
"My first year in the ABL (2014-15) wasn't as great as I hoped, so I knew I wasn't going to be given an opportunity to play back in the States. So I decided to go back to university and get my graduate degree in secondary education and start my career as a high school teacher," Bailey said.
At the same time, Bailey returned to playing Australian Rules Football "just to keep fit and have a bit of fun in the off-season. But I think this different type of fitness gave me the upper hand because when the 2015-16 ABL season came back around I was pitching 10-fold better. This is what put me on the radar for the Australian team."
The Aussies qualified for the World Baseball Classic by winning their pool held in Sydney in February 2016, defeating South Africa, New Zealand and the Philippines. Bailey was not on the Australia team roster at that time, but after promising pitching performances in the ABL in 2015-16, he debuted for the Australian team later that year in a small tournament held in the Netherlands called Haarlem Honkbal (Baseball) Week. Australia finished third against the Netherlands, Japan, Chinese Taipei and Curacao.
"I got two starts in that tournament and pitched really well in both (a win against Curacao and a no-decision against Japan)," he said.
"It was great pitching for Australia in the Netherlands, but I knew there were several big-name players that couldn't make the tournament due to their Major League Baseball or other professional league seasons conflicting, so I knew it was going to be tough to be named on the 27-man roster for the WBC in 2017."
Bailey went on to have an excellent first half to the 2016-17 ABL season with the Heat, which resulted in an invitation and a three-up, three-down inning in the ABL All-Star Game. The second half of his season, however, admittedly "was a little up and down."
When Australia announced its 27-man roster for the WBC, Bailey didn't make the cut.
"I was gutted when I realized I narrowly missed out, but was named as a reserve. I was fortunate enough to travel to Seoul, South Korea, to help the team prepare for the WBC in a game against the Korean national team and another game against Korea's top collegiate team."
After arriving in Seoul, coaches informed Bailey and the three other travel reserves that Liam Hendricks (an Australian pitcher with the Oakland Athletics) was unable to leave spring training and, as a result, a spot had opened up on the roster. Bailey pitched well in an inter-squad game, and subsequently was taken off the reserve list and officially named to Australia's 27-man roster for the WBC.
Two days later the team flew to Osaka, Japan, for a week-long preparation camp consisting of three training days in a minor league indoor facility and two games against Japanese NPB major league teams (the Orix Buffaloes and the Hanshin Tigers) at the massive Kyocera Dome.
They also spent a day being issued team gear.
"That felt like Christmas for baseball players…it was all Nike Team Australia everything," Bailey said.
While in Osaka, Bailey got to pitch one hitless inning against the Buffaloes.
Then it was on to Tokyo.
"From the moment we landed in Japan we were treated like royalty: TV crews, team chefs, endless staff standing around just to guide us where to walk. But Tokyo was unreal," he said. "We caught the bullet train first class to Tokyo, had king-suite hotel rooms for each player, chefs at the stadium in the lockers, private security, MLB athletic trainers and clubhouse staff, gift bags from the WBC that included brand new Beats by Dre headphones...the list is endless."
While Bailey said the off-field experience of the WBC was "ridiculous," the baseball experience was "unbelievable."
In the opening round of the WBC, Australia was pooled with No. 13 in the world China, No. 3 in the world Cuba and the host nation, No. 1 in the world Japan. That pool (1 of 4 pools in Round 1) was held at the world-famous Tokyo Dome, an air-pressured, temperature-regulated, artificial-turfed dome with a seating capacity of 45,000.
"It's the best stadium I've ever seen, let alone played in," Bailey said.
Australia's first WBC game was a sell-out against Japan featuring 45,000 screaming fans with band instruments and chanting...all for Japan. Australia was winning 1-0 until Japan tied it in the fifth inning, then the host team took a 2-1 lead in the seventh and scored another two runs in the eighth to win, 4-1.
Game 2 was against China where the Aussies won with ease, 11-0. Bailey came in and closed out this game by pitching one scoreless inning, only allowing one hit and issuing one walk.
"Seeing as I was extremely excited to just be on the 27-man roster, I was over the moon that I actually got to pitch in the WBC," he said.
Game 3 was a win-or-go-home contest against Cuba as the top two teams from each pool advanced to the second round. (Then the top two from each Round 2 pool advance to the finals in Los Angeles). Australia took a 1-0 lead in the top of the fifth, but Cuba hit back with a grand slam in the bottom of the fifth. Australia brought the score back to a one-run game, but in the end Cuba was victorious, 4-3.
"We were absolutely gutted after being eliminated since this was the closest Australia has come to advancing to the second round of the WBC: two close games that could've quite easily gone our way," Bailey said.Â
Japan went on to advance to the semifinals against Team USA while the Netherlands and Puerto Rico met in the other semifinal. The championship game in Los Angeles featured the U.S. and Puerto Rico, with the Americans winning, 8-0.
Bailey said he realized how big of an achievement the experience was upon returning home to Australia.
"All the students I teach were congratulating me and asking for my autograph," he said.
In addition, the baseball club Bailey grew up playing for, the Wanneroo Giants, asked about framing and hanging one of his Australia jerseys in their clubhouse.
Bailey said he is excited about the future of baseball in Australia.
"Now that we've moved up to being ranked No. 8 in the world, it opens up more opportunities. Along with automatic qualification into 2021 WBC (due to winning a Round 1 game this year), there is the Premier 12 tournament in 2019 featuring the top 12 countries in the world as well as the ultimate goal of the 2020 Olympics in Tokyo.
Bailey would love to be a part of all of that.
For now, though, the former Wayland Baptist Pioneer returns to being Mr. Bailey, the high school health, physical education, and sport science teacher at Shenton College who also pitches for the Perth Heat and the Wanneroo Giants, chasing another ABL championship, State league championship, and another opportunity to wear the green and gold and represent his country.
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