USA needs to move on from Mark DeRosa, look to more experienced managers 

And if Team USA wants to reclaim the WBC crown, it needs experience to be at the forefront of what it looks for in a manager, whether that be for a possible Olympic team with MLB players in 2028 or the next WBC in 2029. 

Team USA needs to turn to what worked in 2017 

Team USA needs to go back to what worked in 2017 when Jim Leyland capped off his Hall of Fame career by leading his country to its only WBC championship. A grittier team with fewer superstars was guided by someone who knew the right moves to make, what buttons to press and what to say in a pressure-filled environment. 

Leyland, of course, had already won 1,769 MLB games as a manager and led a team to the World Series three times, winning with the Florida Marlins in 1997.

There were more experienced options to lead USA in 2026

Leyland-like options were available for USA in 2026, too. Dusty Baker, a native of Riverside, Calif., who will almost certainly join Leyland in the Hall of Fame someday, managed Nicaragua, not USA, this year. The retired Baker was clearly up for managing on the world's stage, but took the only job offered to him. 

Bruce Bochy, who retired for a second time after the 2025 season, has four World Series rings and may have enjoyed an opportunity to run his country's team for three weeks, even if he's no longer interested in the grind of a 162-game-long MLB season. 

Team USA needs to look for someone who has won at a high level 

Baker and Bochy are just two prominent options who could've been available this year if Team USA was as serious as it said about bringing home the gold medal. There are others. And maybe they don't want the stress in two or three years and just be done. But even if that's the case, USA needs to find an actual veteran manager with some success on his resume to take control of whoever is on the roster the next time MLB players can represent their country in an international competition. 

It is fair to acknowledge that Leyland was preceded by a contemporary in 2013. Before Leyland, four-time World Series champion Joe Torre served as USA skipper in 2013. Torre's team failed to advance to the championship round. 

But while nothing will guarantee success for America, especially with so much international talent spread out across MLB, a veteran manager will at least provide the cachet a USA team deserves and appear worthy of the moment.