After a magical run that took Great Britain to its first-ever WBC appearance in 2023, they are returning in 2026 with a much improved roster.
Baseball is the American national pastime, but it evolved from British games like Rounders and Stool Ball. “Base-ball” was mentioned in a children’s book as far back as 1744. Frederick, Prince of Wales – a title indicating the next-in-line to the British throne – was recorded as a player in a 1749 game of “Base Ball” played in Surrey. Though the two sides of the Atlantic chose different bat-and-ball games as pastimes, the British never fully gave up on the American game. The 1930s saw hundreds of clubs spring up across the country, including those that shared grounds and organizations with famous association football clubs. In 1935 the National Baseball Association was founded, and the national team went on to win the first Baseball World Cup – then called the Amateur World Series – in 1938. The outbreak of World War I in 1939 stunted the sport’s growth in the country, however, putting an end to what is known as the golden age of baseball in the United Kingdom.
Baseball was relegated to a minor sport thereafter, but has steadily grown across the island nation into the European force it is today. More than 22,000 people enjoy America’s pastime on England’s green and pleasant land, governed by the British Baseball Federation. The top flight of the sport in the UK is the National Baseball League (NBL), currently fielding five teams which are all in England. The sport continues to grow today, with Major League Baseball’s London Series being a prime example of the ever-increasing popularity of the game across the sceptred isle.
However, it is also important to briefly discuss the history of baseball in the Bahamas, given that six of the seven non-American players on Great Britain’s roster are actually natives of the archipelagic Caribbean commonwealth. Baseball in the Bahamas was long secondary to Cricket, the national sport. However, being far closer to the United States led to the island developing a love for Baseball alongside other imported American sports. In Nassau, the capital and largest city of the Bahamas, the Windsor Park Cricket oval has been retrofitted for baseball. The Bahamas were a former British colony until 1973, and retain King Charles III as the official Monarch to this day. The nation also has its own national baseball team, ranked 40th out of 83 according to the World Baseball Softball Confederation (the organization which jointly runs the World Baseball Classic alongside MLB). It is because the team is so low on the international ladder that many Bahamian baseball players compete for Great Britain. The WBC specifies that even if a player is not currently a citizen of a given nation, they will be able to represent said nation in the Classic if they can prove they are eligible for citizenship. This is how Great Britain, alongside Israel and Italy, are able to field rosters based on heritage and lineage rather than ownership of passports.
It is from Nassau that team co-captain and New York Yankees star Jazz Chisholm Jr. hails. Chisholm became enamored with baseball from a young age thanks to the influence of his grandmother, who was a shortstop with the Bahamian national softball team. Chisholm was drafted by the Arizona Diamondbacks, traded to and later debuted with the Miami Marlins, and currently stars for the New York Yankees. In 2025, Chisholm became just the third Yankee ever to complete a 30-30 season, clocking 30 home runs and stealing 30 bases in, ironically, 130 games. Chisholm’s six seasons in the Majors have been flashy, brilliant and frankly underrated. His 2025 campaign was definitely his finest so far, having put up career-highs with 4.2 Wins Above Replacement (WAR) and 80 RBI, but he’s also had impressive seasons prior to the most recent year. Chisholm’s 2022, for example, saw him record a career-best 138 OPS+ and .535 slugging percentage along with 2.4 WAR in just 60 games. In 2024, Chisholm stole 40 bases and batted .256, both the best single-season marks of his career. In total, the 28-year-old Chisholm has hit 108 home runs and stolen 130 bases, with 522 hits in just six seasons.
After the two-time All Star, however, Great Britain’s punch starts to drop off substantially. Vance Worley, a retired eight-year veteran of the Majors who last pitched professionally in 2022, is among the most notable pitchers on the British roster. Worley played for Great Britain in the 2023 Classic, as well as in the 2022 Qualifiers which earned the team a spot in the big dance. Across both, Worley tossed 6.2 innings with an ERA of 5.40. However, all of that damage came during the Qualifiers as his 2.2 innings of work in the WBC proper were without an earned run scoring. Two unearned runs did cross the plate on his watch. During one of his outings, letters on his gray Great Britain jersey began falling off mid-game, part of a wider issue with the team’s wardrobe which many fans from the ‘23 Classic will surely recall.
In 2023, Harry Ford introduced himself to the wider baseball world as he starred for Great Britain, hitting two home runs and a double, driving in four runs, and batting .308 with a pair of walks. His 2025 call-up to the Seattle Mariners only resulted in eight plate appearances, in which he earned one hit, scored once, and drove in one run. He was traded to the Washington Nationals in the offseason, and is expected to be the ‘catcher of the future’ in the Nats organization. He will co-captain Team Great Britain alongside Chisholm in the WBC.
34-year-old Thrayce Thompson is another member of the British team with Major League experience, having played 369 games with the White Sox, Dodgers, Cubs and Padres. Thompson is currently a free agent, having spent 2025 with Boston’s Triple-A affiliate. While his batting was generally subpar, batting just .226 and recording a .717 OPS, Thompson still had power and clutch as he hit 13 home runs and drove in 44 runs in Worcester. His fielding, always a strength of his, continued to be magnificent as he failed to make a single error in more than 730 outfield innings. In the 2023 WBC, Thompson batted .214 with a home run and two RBI.
Other than four who were part of major league rosters in 2025, twelve members of the team competed in Triple-A, four played in the Atlantic League, two played in the Mexican League, and seven featured in Double-A or lower levels of affiliated pro-ball. They will be led by Brad Marcelino, an Essex-born former national teamer who, at the time of his retirement, held the record for the most European Championships participated in by a British player with seven. He coached for the British national team starting in 2017, scouted for the Baltimore Orioles from 2009 to 2011, was head coach at Torrey Pines High School, and was named manager of the national team for the 2026 WBC. From what I can tell, this World Baseball Classic will be his first time managing a baseball roster above the High School level. But Marcelino is gutsy and evidently fearless, even using the infamous letters-falling-off incident in 2023 as bulletin board material to help motivate his team. Just how far can they go in the 2026 edition of the tournament?
Best-case Scenario:
2-2, failing to advance but qualifying for the next WBC. Great Britain is facing the United States, Mexico, Italy and Brazil in Pool B, playing its games at the Houston Astros’ Daikin Park. While Team USA and Mexico are juggernauts who will almost certainly dispatch the Brits handily, Brazil and Italy are another matter. Italy is clearly the superior team to Great Britain, but the gap is nothing like the difference between the two aforementioned favorites in the pool. And Brazil would count it as a tremendous upset if they were able to beat Great Britain. A world in which the Brits go 2-2 is one where the British baseball community feels as though they are on top of the world.
Worst-case Scenario:
0-4, falling back into Qualifiers for the next WBC. We’ve already discussed Great Britain’s almost-certain losses to the United States and Mexico, but it should be borne in mind that the Italians have a superior roster as well and are very likely to deal Great Britain a third defeat in the ‘26 Classic. Brazil is the only team Great Britain will be expected to beat, but that is hardly guaranteed. If Great Britain is worn out by the time of their finale against Brazil on March 9th, there is ample opportunity for the Brazilians to steal a win and force the Brits back into Qualification.
The Likely Scenario:
1-3, failing to advance but qualifying for the next WBC. If we play the game of odds, this is a pretty obvious outcome; the U.S. and Mexico will likely dominate the British, while Italy will have a somewhat tougher time but still emerge victorious. The Brazilians will more likely than not be facing a focused and hungry British team that will need a win to qualify for the next WBC, and will suffer a loss at their hands. Pool play for Team Great Britain doesn’t seem to have any obvious upsets brewing, as far as I’m concerned.
Batter to Watch:
Matt Koperniak – Born in London, England, Matt Koperniak is the only player on the roster who is a true, native Brit. A well-touted prospect in the St. Louis Cardinals system, Koperniak spent parts of 2022 and 2023 in Triple-A before moving into the lineup full-time for 2024 and 2025. In 341 games at that level, Koperniak sports a .277 batting average, a .348 on-base percentage, 48 home runs, 205 RBI and 365 hits.
Pitcher to Watch:
Nick Wells – Wells, a 30-year-old former farmhand with the Blue Jays, Mariners and Nationals organizations, has spent the last four years pitching in the Atlantic and Mexican leagues, with a brief stint in the Dominican Winter League to boot. While his 202.2 Atlantic League innings have earned him a respectable 4.80 ERA and 215 strikeouts, the much more compelling reason for you to keep your eye on Wells during the WBC is simple: He’s the team’s only left-handed pitcher. The southpaw will probably be called upon for some big matchups for that reason, and I am fascinated to see how he performs.