Team USA was a promising team from the beginning. Team USA manager Mark DeRosa successfully assembled a Cy Young-caliber pitching staff, including Logan Webb, Clayton Kershaw and two Cy Young pitchers in Paul Skenes and Tarik Skubal — a rotation that looked like it could tear through the World Baseball Classic, or WBC.
Additionally, the team had some of the biggest stars in the MLB — Aaron Judge, Kyle Schwarber, Bobby Witt Jr., Bryce Harper and Cal Raleigh? This team looked to be as stacked as teams come. What could possibly go wrong?
Sadly, a lot went wrong for Team USA during this WBC — although the team had Skubal, a back-to-back Cy Young winner, and an incredible closer in Mason Miller, the team struggled to produce run support for these pitchers. It also did not benefit the team that Skubal was limited to only one start against Great Britain — his arsenal would have been better used against a more competitive team such as Venezuela, who they would eventually lose to.
Here is the entire journey of Team USA through the World Baseball Classic.
Team USA’s first few games were a breeze — the first game that Team USA played was Brazil, who Webb absolutely dominated. He retired 12 batters in a row, and pitched four innings with six strikeouts and one earner run, which was a solo home run in the first inning. USA won this game 15-5, giving Webb the best run support that any Team USA pitcher would see for the rest of the tournament.
Team USA then faced off against Great Britain, who saw Skubal take the ball — this was an easy lineup, with one of the only notable players in the lineup being Yankees infielder Jazz Chisholm Jr. Though Skubal was on a pitch limit, he pitched a respectable three innings with one earned run and five strikeouts. Team USA won this game 9-1.
Then came the infamous game against Team Mexico that sent the media into a frenzy. Randy Arozarena, a left fielder for the Seattle Mariners, stepped up to the plate and offered a handshake to his teammate, catcher Raleigh. Raleigh declined the handshake, which drew heavy media attention largely criticizing Raleigh for a lack of respect by declining the handshake.
Despite the media debacle, Team USA was able to narrowly declare victory over Team Mexico. Skenes started the game for Team USA, and pitched four shutout innings with seven strikeouts. Judge and Roman Anthony both hit home runs, which would score all of Team USA’s runners for the game — Judge’s home run brought home two runners, while Anthony’s brought in three. Team USA won this game 5-3.
Remember the media debacle with Arozarena and Raleigh? Well, the media drama was far from over. After Team USA’s game against the undefeated Team Italy, manager DeRosa took to the podcast “Hot Stove” to say that prior to the game, he claimed that the U.S. had “punched their ticket” into the WBC quarterfinals. But this was not the case. Fans criticized him heavily for mishandling the situation, risking Team USA being eliminated from the quarterfinals after their 8-6 loss to Team Italy.
Instead, DeRosa’s overconfidence led to Team USA’s advancement to the quarterfinals being contingent on specific performances by Team Italy and Team Mexico when they faced off. Thankfully for Team USA, Italy won against Mexico, knocking Mexico out of the tournament and allowing the US to advance.
In the quarterfinals, the U.S. was able to face Team Canada, a rivalry as old as time — Team USA once again reasserted their dominance in the USA-Canada rivalry by beating them 5-3. Webb yet again took the ball for Team USA, pitching 4.2 innings with zero earned runs and five strikeouts. Team USA was able to score all of their runs through small ball play, getting small hits and putting the ball in play to outscore Canada.
Up to this point in the tournament, Team USA had faced very few problems except for Team Italy — but that was simply an upset. The real challenge came when Team USA faced the Dominican Republic in the semifinals, who had a star-studded lineup that certainly rivaled the power of Team USA.
With their lineup consisting of stars like Vladimir Guerrero Jr., Manny Machado, Ketel Marte, Geraldo Perdomo, Juan Soto, Julio Rodríguez and Fernando Tatís Jr., this team almost looked unstoppable — they had looked that way especially after their wins over Team Israel and Venezuela.
The USA won against the Dominican Republic, but barely — the entire game was a pitching duel, with barely any runs being scored by either team. The only runs that came in for Team USA were off of solo home runs by Gunnar Henderson and Anthony, and the Dominican Republic would only score one run off of a solo home run by Junior Caminero.
The pitching staff on both teams performed extremely well for the lineups they had to face off against. Luis Severino, who pitched to a 4.54 ERA last season with the Athletics, pitched 3.1 innings of one run ball and six strikeouts, whereas Skenes took the ball for team USA and pitched 4.1 innings of one run ball with two strikeouts.
But in the end, Team USA was able to vanquish the intimidating threat that was the Dominican Republic — with this victory, they would now advance to the WBC final again, as they did in 2023.
However, in a heartbreaking fashion, this WBC final ended for Team USA the exact same way that the last one did — a strikeout to end the game with a score of 3-2. This game would result in Venezuela’s first ever WBC championship win, and marked a major upset.
Venezuela’s pitching staff dominated the US — especially Arizona Diamondbacks starter Eduardo Rodríguez. What came as a surprise is how well Eduardo Rodríguez pitched against Team USA — for the past two years, Eduardo Rodríguez has struggled in the MLB, pitching to over a 5.00 ERA in those seasons. Despite these struggles, Eduardo Rodríguez was able to show up when it mattered most and pitched four shutout innings against the US.
This was undoubtedly Team USA’s biggest failure throughout the WBC — their inability to hit in clutch situations destroyed their chances of taking home the trophy. Team USA was shut out until the bottom of the eighth inning, when Harper launched a two-run home run to tie the game — this home run made the US look like they had a fighting chance.
However, Venezuela was able to rally back, with an RBI hit from Eugenio Suarez in the top of the ninth to take the lead over Team USA, making the score 3-2. Anthony struck out to end the game, leaving a second straight WBC where Team USA’s run ended in heartbreak.
Team USA will look to compete for a WBC championship win again in the next WBC, which will take place in 2030.
