{"id":8939,"date":"2026-03-23T14:44:32","date_gmt":"2026-03-23T18:44:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.shu.edu\/stillmanexchange\/?p=8939"},"modified":"2026-03-23T14:44:32","modified_gmt":"2026-03-23T18:44:32","slug":"team-italy-upsets-team-usa-in-the-wbc","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.shu.edu\/stillmanexchange\/2026\/03\/23\/team-italy-upsets-team-usa-in-the-wbc\/","title":{"rendered":"Team Italy Upsets Team USA in The WBC"},"content":{"rendered":"

Rachel Gaudette<\/em><\/strong>
\nStaff Writer<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

The World Baseball Classic has always been a stage for international drama and competition; however the Italy vs. USA game created a massive shockwave. On Tuesday, March 10th<\/sup>, Team USA\u00a0was upset by Italy, with the final score being\u00a08-6. The loss for the USA was\u00a0largely blamed\u00a0on\u00a0the managing decisions of USA\u2019s manager, Mark DeRosa.\u00a0This was a shock for fans, analysts, and players alike, as the USA was significantly favored to win.<\/p>\n

\"\"
Team Italy’s Sam Antonacci in The Dugout; Photo Courtesy of Getty Images<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Entering the game, Team USA was the heavy favorite, with a star-studded roster led by their captain, Aaron Judge. The Italians were not fearful of the team and played with\u00a0a high level of intensity.\u00a0The Italy offense exploded\u00a0early on with home runs from Kyle Teel, Sam Antonacci, and Jac\u00a0Caglianone. By the sixth inning, Italy held a staggering lead of 8-0.\u00a0Team USA was able to make a\u00a0valiant but late\u00a0comeback with two home runs from Pete Crow-Armstrong and another from Gunnar Henderson.\u00a0Italian closer, Greg Weissert sealed their win by striking out Judge in the ninth and leaving the United States at risk for knockout from the WBC.<\/p>\n

\"\"
Team USA Manager Mark DeRosa in The Dugout; Photo Courtesy of AP News<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The\u00a0manager\u00a0for Team USA,\u00a0Mark DeRosa, faced extreme backlash for his coaching decisions within the game against Team Italy.\u00a0DeRosa stated on MLB Network\u2019s\u00a0Hot Stove<\/em>\u00a0before the game that Team USA had \u201calready punched its ticket to the quarterfinals,\u201d\u00a0which was a false claim displaying a cocky attitude towards the Italy game.\u00a0DeRosa decided to rest\u00a0key left-handed batters like\u00a0Bryce Harper\u00a0and\u00a0Brice\u00a0Turang, despite the Italian starter being a right-handed pitcher, which usually marks an advantage for lefty hitters. They\u00a0were\u00a0overconfident that they would win, and benched key players, which led to one of the biggest upsets in 20 years.<\/p>\n

\"\"
Pitcher Clayton Kershaw Warming up in The Bullpen; Photo Courtesy of Instagram User @dodgersnext<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

In addition to this, the team decided to have Clayton Kershaw warm up during the eighth inning\u00a0as an emergency reliever instead of the closer, Mason Miller.\u00a0DeRosa explained this decision by saying that the World Baseball Classic limits pitch counts, and if\u00a0David Bednar reached his limit\u00a0Kershaw would have been the only usable pitcher.\u00a0There were multiple other coaching decisions that led to the shocking loss to Italy, like when DeRosa decided to have Bryce Harper pinch-hit for Paul Goldschmidt, but not pinch-run for him in the ninth.<\/p>\n

In the end, Team USA\u2019s survival\u00a0in the tournament rested on the shoulders of the exact same team that beat them. Italy\u2019s 9-1 blowout against Mexico\u00a0secured America\u2019s advancement to the quarterfinals as the Pool B runner-up.\u00a0Despite being bailed out by Italy, the loss is one that will\u00a0serve as an example for future teams.\u00a0This game can be used as a textbook example of the dangers behind overconfidence. In the World Baseball Classic, no lead is\u00a0safe,\u00a0no\u00a0game\u00a0can be taken for granted, and no ticket is ever \u201cpunched\u201d until the game is over, as DeRosa and his team learned the hard way.<\/p>\n

Contact Rachel at gaudetra@shu.edu<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

After writing off Italy before the game even began, a rude awakening was inevitable for Mark DeRosa and the rest of Team USA.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4872,"featured_media":8943,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"colormag_page_container_layout":"default_layout","colormag_page_sidebar_layout":"default_layout","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[6,2],"tags":[1625,64,911,19,179,1133,1822,1411],"class_list":["post-8939","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sports","category-trending","tag-1625","tag-baseball","tag-italy","tag-march","tag-mlb","tag-usa","tag-wbc","tag-world-baseball-classic"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.shu.edu\/stillmanexchange\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8939","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.shu.edu\/stillmanexchange\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.shu.edu\/stillmanexchange\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.shu.edu\/stillmanexchange\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4872"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.shu.edu\/stillmanexchange\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8939"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.shu.edu\/stillmanexchange\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8939\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8969,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.shu.edu\/stillmanexchange\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8939\/revisions\/8969"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.shu.edu\/stillmanexchange\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8943"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.shu.edu\/stillmanexchange\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8939"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.shu.edu\/stillmanexchange\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8939"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.shu.edu\/stillmanexchange\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8939"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}