Top 3 Moments In Olympic Baseball

Before he became the ace of the Milwaukee Brewers, Ben Sheets had a career-defining moment in Australia. He threw a complete-game, three-hit shutout of what was considered the best national team in the world, a 4-0 victory that gave the United States its first gold medal in the sport.

It was only the second loss ever for the Cuban team in the Olympics.

"This is bigger than the World Series," USA manager Tommy Lasorda told the San Francisco Chronicle. "I've managed four World Series, and when the Dodgers have won, the Dodgers fans were happy, but the Cincinnati fans weren't, the San Francisco fans weren't. But today, with this baseball team, the United States of America is happy."

Australia is not a baseball hotbed, but they served notice that some pretty good baseball is played down under with a 1-0 shutout of heavily favored Japan in the semifinal round in 2004.

Australia defeated future Red Sox star Daisuke Matsuzaka in the game. Matsuzaka struck out 13 in seven innings, but scratched across one run, and Australia starter Chris Oxpring made it stand up for six innings, and reliever Jeff Williams finished off the last three innings.

Australia skipper David Nilsson, who was a catcher for the Milwaukee Brewers from 1992-99 described the win as "the best moment in Australian baseball,” according to the Sydney Morning Herald.

Australia lost to Cuba in the gold medal game, but the silver was Australia's first medal.

In the first two Olympic games in baseball, there was no match for the Cuban national team. They rolled to the gold medal in 1992 in Barcelona and 1996 in Atlanta, and won their first three games in Sydney in 2000 until a scrappy Netherlands team knocked off Cuba 4-2 in a preliminary game. Cuba won a silver medal that year, then bounced back to win again in 2004.

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