Bold: Canada arrived at Daikin Park wearing silver medal hockey jerseys

Team Canada walked into Daikin Park in Houston tonight wearing Team Canada hockey jerseys. Silver medal hockey jerseys. The ones from the Olympics where the United States beat them in the gold medal game. Twice. The men and the women.

If wearing silver medal hockey jerseys to a baseball game is the motivational strategy Canada is going with as a heavy underdog in single elimination play, then Team USA should have no problem tonight.

You do not show up to take someone’s sport wearing the jersey from the sport you just lost. That is not a revenge game mentality. That is a participation trophy mentality. Keep the silver at home.

Team Canada wearing silver medal hockey jerseys in pregame warmups

Team Canada wearing their hockey jerseys in pregame warmups pic.twitter.com/ELYVZhGwQ6

— Bob Nightengale (@BNightengale) March 13, 2026

Team USA vs. Canada: Americans backed into the WBC Quarterfinals and now they have to prove they actually want to be there

Team USA is -4.5 on the run line with a total of 9.5. Logan Webb gets the ball for the Americans. Michael Soroka starts for Canada.

Let’s be honest about how Team USA got here though. They did not earn this. They needed Italy to beat Mexico on Wednesday just to stay alive after sleepwalking through pool play and getting embarrassed 8-6 by the Italians in their final game. Vinnie Pasquantino, a Kansas City Royal playing for Italy, hit three home runs against Mexico to bail them out. The first three-homer game in WBC history. Team USA did not advance. They were rescued.

Mark DeRosa has been under fire all week and rightfully so. The interviews have been beyond stupid regardless of which side of the debate you land on. Pitchers have been walking out the door since the tournament started. Skubal, Wacha, Yarbrough, Kershaw, and Clay Holmes are all gone. Will Vest, Tyler Rogers, Tim Hill, and Joe Ryan are in. The optics have been a mess and the baseball has not been much better.

At least Team USA did not show up to pool play in silver medal hockey jerseys. Canada set the bar on the floor tonight and somehow the Americans have been limbo dancing under it all week.

Canada is not a pushover on paper. Ernie Whitt, born in Detroit but a revered former Blue Jays catcher, has managed Canada in every WBC and has them in the quarterfinals for the first time. They went 3-1 in pool play, clinching with a 7-2 win over Cuba in a win-or-go-home game, the first time in WBC history that Cuba did not advance past pool play. Their bullpen allowed just three earned runs over 21.1 innings all tournament. Owen Cassie and Abraham Toro combined for a .983 OPS. James Paxton came out of retirement, threw 2.2 dominant innings against Cuba, and was pulled strategically to stay eligible tonight.

Still though. Silver medal hockey jerseys. At a baseball game. Against the country that beat you in hockey. Twice.

Soroka is 28 and coming off a 3-8 season split between Washington and Chicago with a 4.52 ERA. He gave up one run over three innings in Canada’s pool play opener sitting 94.7 mph. He is not an ace. Logan Webb is better. This is a favorable matchup for the Americans and it should stay that way.

Webb dominated Brazil in pool play, retiring 12 straight batters with six strikeouts over four innings. He has been sharp all spring and this is exactly the kind of start you want heading into a knockout round.

Team USA is 4-1 all-time against Canada in the WBC. The most recent meeting was 2023, a 12-1 run-rule win. The history is firmly on the American side.

The winner faces either Korea or the Dominican Republic in Sunday’s semifinals in Miami. A potential USA-DR semifinal would be one of the better baseball games of the year. Beyond that, a USA-Japan championship rematch is on the table, a callback to 2023 when Ohtani struck out Trout for the final out in one of the most iconic moments in tournament history. That is what is at stake here.

Tonight needs to be a statement. Team USA has spent this entire tournament playing down to the moment. The knockout rounds do not allow for that anymore. Canada is out here wearing the wrong country’s sport on their backs as a motivational tool and somehow that is the most on-brand thing that has happened in this tournament.

8 PM. FOX. Houston. No more slip-ups. Keep the silver medals in Canada where they belong. And for the love of god, keep Mark DeRosa away from all microphones.

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