Manager Ricardo Medina, a 51-year-old former Minor League Baseball (MiLB) corner infielder, announced Panama's 20-player roster for the XXXI WBSC U-18 Baseball World Cup.
Pitchers (8): Dereck Gómez (Coclé), Miguel Gómez (Oeste), Benjamín González (Metro), Marcos Pimentel (Veraguas), Moisés Castillo (Los Santos), Efraín Cubillas (Coclé), Kelvin Contreras (Chiriquí) and Anthony Gantes (Chiriquí).
Catchers (2) José Bernal (Coclé) and Álvaro Ríos (Chiriquí).
Infielders (6) Héctor Rayo (Bocas), Carlos Bethancourth (Oeste), Joey Wood (Este), Dimas Oda (Metro), Roderick Lezcano (Coclé) and Julio Casas (Herrera).
Outfielders (4) Edwin Walden (Bocas), Jeremy Sánchez (Oeste), José González (Colón) and Nelson Guerra (Coclé).
"The beauty of it all, besides that they are all from the national leagues who trained hard from day one, is that almost all the sports provinces have at least one representative on the team and that is positive," Medina told Panama sports channel COS.
Medina's coaching staff will include pitching coach Andy Hernández and assistant coaches Audes De León and Israel Delgado,
“We have seven rights and one left," Hernandez said. "We focused on preparing four or five in the starting role and I think we achieved the goal. We also have three who can work as relief players and three position players who can help us if necessary to rest the staff."
World No. 11 Pamana, who has finished eighth and ninth in the past two editions and has a best finish of fourth in 1984 and 1999, is included in Group B. They will debut against No. 6 Venezuela on Friday, 1 September, at Tianmu Stadium in Taipei City.
They will also face No. 1 Japan, No. 2 USA, No. 7 Netherlands and No. 21 Spain.
