A look at Team USA's historic roster for the 2026 World Baseball Classic

Team USA's Kyle Schwarber reacts to home run in 2023 World Baseball Classic title game
Team USA's Kyle Schwarber reacts to home run in 2023 World Baseball Classic title gameMegan Briggs/Getty Images

The 2026 World Baseball Classic will be underway this week, and Team USA are poised to make their second title run with the most stacked roster in the tournament's history!

After looking to take revenge on Team Japan following their title game defeat in 2023, Team USA is primed now more than ever to not only win the 2026 World Baseball Classic - they're here to dominate it outright.

Of the 30 players on their roster, Team USA has a combined 64 MLB All-Star selections, 20 Silver Sluggers, 12 Gold Gloves, six MVP awards, three Cy Young Awards, and three Platinum Gloves.

The average age for this year's roster is 27 years and seven months, with the oldest being Clayton Kershaw (37) and the youngest being Roman Anthony (21). 

And be sure to check out the full schedule, Pool groups, and tournament details here.

Team USA's historic roster

They're bringing the most stacked roster in the history of the World Baseball Classic this time around, so let's break it down by position. 

At catcher, it'll be Cal Raleigh (Seattle Mariners) and Will Smith (Los Angeles Dodgers). This past season, Raleigh, 29, led all of Major League Baseball with 60 home runs and led the American League with 125 runs batted in. He went on to earn his first All-Star selection, broke multiple records, and earned his first Silver Slugger award in what was the greatest hitting season by a catcher in MLB history.

Smith, 30, is also one of the best-hitting catchers in the game and is a three-time All-Star himself, also a three-time World Series champion. His .296 batting average would've been the best among all catchers had he just played in 20 more games - he played in 110. 

At first base, the U.S. has seven-time All-Star Paul Goldschmidt (New York Yankees) and eight-time All-Star Bryce Harper (Philadelphia Phillies). Between the two, they each combined for three MVPs, nine Silver Slugger awards, and four Gold Gloves. 

Despite Goldschmidt, 37, hitting a career-low 10 home runs last season in 146 games, he still batted .274 from the plate. Harper, 33, hit 27 home runs and 75 RBI last season with a solid .261 batting average. So while they aren't in their primes anymore, they are more than capable of being a pair of dangerous bats. 

At second base is Brice Turang, 26, who is coming over the best season of his young career. After not hitting more than eight home runs and 60 RBI his first two seasons, also failing to hit above .255, Turang exploded in 2025 with 18 home runs, 81 RBI, and a great .288 batting average. 

In 2024, Turang became the first Brewers player to ever win the Platinum Glove Award for his stellar defensive prowess in the infield (also winning his first Gold Glove that season). 

At shortstop, it'll be Bobby Witt Jr. (Kansas City Royals) and Gunnar Henderson (Baltimore Orioles) - the two youngest superstars on the team. Witt, 25, has won two Gold Gloves, one Platinum Glove, two Silver Sluggers, and has been selected to the American League All-Star team twice - all in the past two seasons while finishing second in AL MVP voting (2024) and fourth (2025). 

Witt has led the entire MLB in hits in back-to-back seasons, while also coming off a 2025 campaign in which he led the league in doubles with 47 - two more than the previous year - and posted 38 stolen bases (tied for the third-most in the league).

In the same four seasons as Witt (2022-2025), Henderson, 24, is a former AL Rookie of the Year who also has an All-Star selection (2024) and Silver Slugger (2023) in his accolades case. He batted a solid .274 with 30 stolen bases (19th).

At third base is three-time All-Star Alex Bregman (Chicago Cubs). Bregman, 31, who has a Gold Glove and Silver Slugger award to his name, is coming off a solid season. His .272 batting average was his best since his career-year in 2019, despite only hitting 18 home runs (a career low - 100 games min.). 

He'll be joined by Toronto's Ernie Clement (29), who hit a solid .277 last season with nine home runs and 50 RBI. 

The outfield is led by seven-time All-Star Aaron Judge (New York Yankees) in right field, who has won the American League MVP award in three of the past four seasons. Judge, 33, is coming off a year where he hit 53 home runs, 114 RBI, and led all of baseball in: batting average (.331), on-base percentage (.457), slugging percentage (.688), and OPS (1.114). 

Paired with him in the outfield are two-time All-Star and Platinum Glove-winning centerfielder Byron Buxton, 32 (Minnesota Twins), who is coming off a career year with 35 home runs, 83 RBI, and 24 stolen bases, reigning Gold Glove winner and 23-year-old All-Star selection Pete Crow-Armstrong (Chicago Cubs), and 21-year-old rookie sensation Roman Anthony (Boston Red Sox), who finished third in AL Rookie of the Year voting.

The team's designated hitter will be the three-time All-Star and reigning NL leader in home runs, Kyle Schwarber (Philadelphia Phillies). 

Schwarber, 32, led the NL in home runs with 56 (No. 2 in MLB behind Raleigh) and led all of MLB with 132 RBI. He finished as the NL MVP runner-up to the Los Angeles Dodgers and Team Japan superstar Shohei Ohtani.

The veteran, coming off his 11th season, has hit at least 45 home runs in three of the past four years. He also hit a solo home run during the 2023 WBC title game against Japan that cut their deficit to 3-2 off Yu Darvish. 

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As for starting pitchers, they're headlined by Tarik Skubal (Detroit Tigers) and Paul Skenes (Pittsburgh Pirates) - widely regarded as the two best pitchers in the entire world, both of whom won AL Cy Young and NL Cy Young, respectively, this past season. 

Skubal, 29, has won back-to-back Cy Youngs after having the best ERA in the AL in each of the past two seasons. In 2024, he became the 22nd pitcher in MLB history to win the Triple Crown after leading the AL in wins (18), ERA (2.39), and strikeouts (228). However, Skubal announced he will only be pitching in one game before returning to the Tigers' Spring Training camp.

Skenes, 23, announced something similar, as he'll only be starting two games. He won the ERA title this past season, putting up a jaw-dropping 1.97 ERA - the best in all of baseball - with 216 strikeouts. 

Continuing wih starting pitchers, the U.S. boasts Clay Holmes (32) and rookie sensation Nolan McLean (24) from the New York Mets, future Hall of Famer Clayton Kershaw, 37 (Dodgers), who announced his retirement from the MLB this past season, Matthew Boyd, 35 (Chicago Cubs), Michael Wacha, 34 (Kansas City Royals), Logan Webb, 29 (San Francisco Giants) and Ryan Yarbrough, 34 (New York Yankees), who is replacing Minnesota Twins 2025 All-Star Joe Ryan due to a back injury (read more about the details here).

Between those six, they combine for 17 MLB All-Star selections (11 from Kershaw alone). Boyd, 35, Holmes, 32, or Webb, 29, could likely be the two it'll come down to as the team's No. 1 starters once Skenes and Skubal depart. 

Boyd is coming off his first All-Star season, tossing a 3.21 ERA with 154 strikeouts in 179.2 innings last season, while Holmes, who was just converted to a starting pitcher for the first time in his eight-year career last season, finished with a 3.53 ERA and 129 strikeouts in 165.2 innings. 

As for Webb, he led the entire National League with 224 strikeouts through an MLB-leading 207 innings, finishing the season with his second All-Star selection, his first Gold Glove, and fourth in NL Cy Young voting. 

As for Team USA's bullpen pitchers, they're led by the ever-so-dominant closer Mason Miller (San Diego), along with Brad Keller, 30 (Philadelphia Phillies), Garrett Cleavinger (31) and Griffin Jax (31) from the Tampa Bay Rays, Garrett Whitlock, 29 (Boston Red Sox), and Gabe Speier, 30 (Seattle Mariners).

As the youngest reliever on the team at 27, Miller is considered the most ferocious reliever in baseball after coming off back-to-back seasons tossing 104 strikeouts in 65 innings or less. His fastball can reach close to 105 mph, along with a disgusting slider that has over a 55% whiff rate, 

And, surprisingly, he's the only All-Star in Team USA's bullpen who all finished the 2025 season with an ERA below 2.65 besides Jax (4.23). 

That, ladies and gentlemen, is your 2026 Team USA WBC roster.