Molina stars as Puerto Rico defeats the Dominican Republic in WBC play

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Puerto Rico and the Dominican Republic faced off in San Diego last night in second round World Baseball Classic play. Puerto Rico prevailed 3-1, handing the Dominican its first loss in 11 WBC games dating back to 2009.

Yadier Molina had an RBI single and a solo home run in Puerto Rico’s win over the Dominican Republic in the World Baseball Classic on Tuesday. Molina also thew out Nelson Cruz trying to steal to end the eighth inning. And he got him by a mile. Watch Javier Baez take the throw here. He’s giving Molina a shoutout even before the tag is applied:

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This is just the first game in a four-team round robin, so both will continue on, but Puerto Rico draws first blood.

Roger Clemens will be an analyst for ESPN on opening day

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Roger Clemens will be an analyst for ESPN when the defending World Series champion Houston Astros host the Chicago White Sox on opening day.

Clemens made four appearances on last year’s KayRod Cast with Michael Kay and Alex Rodriguez. He will be stepping in on March 30 for David Cone, who will be doing the New York Yankees opener against the San Francisco Giants on YES Network.

“Roger has been sort of a friend of ours for the last year, so to speak, he’s in. He’s been engaged, knowledgeable and really present,” said ESPN Vice President of Production Phil Orlins. “You know, whatever past may be, he’s still tremendously engaged and he really brought that every time he was with us.”

Clemens was a seven-time Cy Young winner but his career after baseball has been tainted by allegations of performance-enhancing drug use. He is a Houston native and pitched for the Astros for three seasons.

Orlins said that with the rules changes and pitch clock, it is important to have a pitcher in the booth with Karl Ravech and Eduardo Perez.

“We don’t feel like we have to have the dynamic of Eduardo with a pitcher, but we certainly think that works. Throw in the added factor of rule changes and it is better to have a batter-pitcher perspective,” Orlins said.

Orlins did not say if this would open the door for future opportunities for Clemens as an ESPN analyst.