Team USA Loses To Team Mexico In World Baseball Classic: Is It Time To Worry?

Everybody stay calm, it’ll all go away if we stay calm…right? Team USA got clobbered by Team Mexico last night, losing their second game of pool play by a score of 11 to 5. Now, team USA, who are 1-1 in round one, is in a weird spot where another loss will be hard to come back from.

So, is it time to worry? Odds provided by FanDuel Sportsbook may indicate that it is.

While FanDuel still has team USA as the second-most favored team to win the title, their odds have drastically dropped. Before the first pitch, their odds of winning the championship were +275. Now? They sit at +390.

So what went wrong? Well, I think that’s pretty obvious–team USA has NO pitching. Padres reliever Nick Martinez took the mound last night to start the game and only made it 2 and 2/3rds before getting pulled out after giving up five hits and three earned runs. The pain didn’t stop there, as Brady Singer gave up four runs in the fourth and Daniel Bard gave up another four in the eighth.

Tonight, team USA will send out White Sox starter Lance Lynn in their game against Canada, which starts at 10 PM EST. Lynn struggled in 2022, posting a record of 8-7 with a 4.00 ERA. He’s posted an HR/9 rate of 1+ in his last three MLB seasons, and his K/9 rate dropped by a whole point between 2021/2022.

Lynn will look to get Team USA back on the winning side of things in their matchup against Canada, and DraftKings Sportsbook thinks he’ll do just that. As of right now, team USA is a -3.5 run favorite, and -500 to win the game.

What Does The Future Hold For Team USA?

Luckily for team USA, their pool isn’t THAT talented. After tonight’s game against Canada, they’ll only have one game left against Colombia. Clinching a spot in the quarterfinals with two losses is incredibly hard, so while they don’t HAVE to win their next two games, it will surely make fans across the country much more comfortable.

Assuming they’re able to fend off Canada and Colombia, a spot in the Quarterfinals awaits them. As things currently stand, it looks like they’ll either be playing Venezuela or the Dominican Republic in that game–and that’s what scares me.

Venezuela is RED HOT as of late, and the Dominican Republic, although they lost their first game, is always dangerous. Also, what both of these teams have that the US does not, is pitching–and not only starting pitching, but they have DEEP rotations and bullpens that could give any team trouble.

While I obviously still love our chances of taking home the baseball World Cup, our early pitching struggles are making me nervous, to say the least.