Team Australia infielder Travis Bazzana has yet to make his Major League Baseball debut, but he has already made MLB history. Bazzana became the first Australian-born player to be drafted in the first round when the Cleveland Guardians made him the first overall pick in 2024. Two years later, the top prospect is knocking at MLB’s door. After finishing last year at Triple-A, where he had an .858 OPS in 26 games before his season was cut short by an oblique injury, Bazzana was a non-roster invite at big-league camp this spring. He’s far from a lock to make the Opening Day roster, but he’s on track to be patrolling second base in Cleveland at some point this year. Before that happens, though, Bazzana had another debut to make. He helped his home country win its first game at the World Baseball Classic by homering in Australia’s 3-0 win over Chinese Taipei at the Tokyo Dome on Thursday.Australia’s Travis Bazzana hits homer, extending lead over Chinese Taipei Two weeks before Bazzana left for Japan, I caught up with the 23-year-old infielder to talk about growing up playing baseball in the suburbs of Sydney, why and how he was drawn to the sport, the food he misses most from back home, the allure of representing Australia in the WBC, his 2026 goals and more. I know you played cricket and other more popular Australian sports growing up. What drew you to baseball? My dad played a lot of sports. He played rugby, cricket, baseball primarily, and he was solid at all three. I’m the youngest of three boys, and they were around the field, Dad was around the baseball club, and I just took a lot of attention to it. I would ask my parents to hit tee-ball. I would be the bat boy for my older brothers and run around the field. I loved every second of just being at the baseball field and watching and taking it all in. It never got pushed on me, neither my brothers, but it became my identity early on. As early as I can remember writing about what I wanted to do, it was like I wanted to be a baseball player, and everyone knew I played baseball. That was just like my thing. I played all the other sports, but baseball is what I took a passion to. If I had a chance to sit down with free time when I was little, I was watching MLB.com highlights.How hard was it to find people to play baseball with in Australia? (Photo by Daniel Shirey/WBCI/MLB Photos via Getty Images) There are lots of baseball clubs and lots of Little League systems and things in place…
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2026-03-05 05:27:19
