WORLD BASEBALL CLASSIC: QUARTERFINALS - USA VS CANADA

March 13, 2026

Mark DeRosa

Kyle Schwarber

Daikin Park

Team USA

Pregame Press Conference

Q. DeRo, can you address the lineup changes going back to the original?

MARK DEROSA: Wanted to give Harper a day. He's back in there. Bregman's back in there. And then really the only change is with a right-hander on the mound is PCA's back in there.

Q. Kyle, after the scare where you had to essentially watch and see Italy win, do you feel like there's more of a locked-in attitude, perhaps, than there was before? Have you guys just been the same the whole time?

KYLE SCHWARBER: No, we've been the same. I think that's the best thing about our game. It's baseball. We have more than capable roster to do a lot of special things.

That's when you tip your cap to the other team. They went there. They did it. They won. And they had a heck of pool play. They went out there the other day, took care of business, and we find ourselves here.

So we're more than excited to be here in this position. I know every single guy we have in that room is looking forward to the opportunity and looking forward to tonight and looking forward to get out there on that field and show what we have and represent the three letters across our chest, because that's what it's about. And we go from here on out.

That's why I love baseball. Anyone can beat anyone. And we don't ever take a day for granted when we're in the locker room or take a day for granted when we're wearing USA across our chest.

Q. Kyle, what was it like watching that game the other night knowing that it was out of your hands for that night?

KYLE SCHWARBER: I mean, it felt like we were watching a baseball game. We put ourselves in that position, at the end of the day. We didn't do what we needed to do to win a baseball game the night before.

I credit a lot of our guys for going out there when we got down early. We never quit. We put runs up on the board, big important runs, and put ourselves in the position to move on to the next round.

So you're just sitting there, watching the game, and you take the result at the end of the day. And that result put us here, and we're looking forward to the next challenge.

Q. Mark, do you have any advance scouts watching Canada last round, and pretty much had to study up on that bullpen as a lot of those guys are unfamiliar?

MARK DEROSA: Yeah, 100 percent. We've had scouts watching them. They got some guys certainly swinging at-bats and they've adjusted their lineup. They had two different lineups versus right-handed pitching in pool play, and they've completely -- Caissie's in the fourth slot now; he's been swinging it good. I know Toro's been swinging it good. More of a right, left, all the way down the lineup with Toro being a switch hitter in the middle.

Q. You get to the stage and you can stretch out your starter more from the pitch-count standpoint, but it's also every game's an elimination game. What is your mindset in terms of just the aggressiveness with the bullpen.

MARK DEROSA: My mindset is a lot of trust in Logan Web. We'll take him right around 70 pitches -- 15 more than he threw the previous game. But there's 10 bullpen bullets down there that we certainly will use. But I have a lot of faith in him to give us some length.

Q. Mark, the U.S. has beaten Canada in a couple of recent sporting events. Has that topic come up at all in the clubhouse?

MARK DEROSA: I'm singularly focused on tonight. We played them in pool play last time, in '23. I was a part of the 2009 Team USA. We played them up in Toronto. So just a ton of respect. A ton of big leaguers in the middle of that order.

Josh Naylor has been a darn good player for a long time. Mike Soroka burst into the big leagues and was like a rocket ship early. A couple of Achilles injuries kind of derailed him for a little bit. But certainly a ton of respect for the way they go about it.

Q. With the elimination round being here and you can't lose anything anymore, you've got a lot of late-inning weapons in that pen. Will you ever need to use some on multiple nights in a row, or can you alternate still, or what?

MARK DEROSA: Yeah, absolutely. Definitely some of the guardrails have loosened a little bit. I don't think you'll see multiple arms if and hopefully when we win this game. I don't think you'll see a bunch of guys go three out of five, but certainly kind of the guardrails have loosened a little bit with regard to our bullpen.