Rosters were announced for all 20 teams expected to participate at the highly anticipated upcoming 2026 World Baseball Classic, which is set to be played between March 3-17 in Puerto Rico, Japan and two United States locations.
It should come as no surprise by now that multiple alumni of the New Balance Baseball Future Stars Series are expected to play prominent roles in the event…not to mention that CEO Jeremy Booth will be on hand for the games played in Houston covering them as an analyst for KHOU-TV.
Here’s a look at some of the players and coaching staff members with FSS ties that you can expect to see over the two week-long slate of games.
Nolan McLean; RHP, United States
McLean played in the 2019 National Tournaments as a member of the Dirtbags, where he was one of the premier two-way talents in the country at the time. He remained in that conversation at Oklahoma State and even after being drafted by the New York Mets with the 91st overall pick of the 2023 MLB Draft. He eventually abandoned hitting midway through the 2024 season while in Double-A Binghamton, and then experienced a meteoric rise as a pitcher, taking the big leagues by storm in 2025 and finishing with a 5-1 record and 2.06 ERA in eight MLB starts with the Mets, where he struck out 57 batters in 48 innings of work. He is universally considered the best pitching prospect in baseball — MLB Pipeline has him at No. 6 overall, while Baseball America slots him in at No. 8 — and could potentially play a significant role for Team USA.
That shouldn’t be a shocker if you look at his FSS scouting report from 2019, where one of our scouts who saw him on the mound said he was the “best HS talent I have seen,” and another who accurately pinned him at the time as a “pro, early round pick.”
Adam Macko; LHP, Canada
A Slovakia native who famously taught himself how to pitch through watching highlight videos on YouTube, Macko pitched for the World Team at International Week at Camelback Ranch and more than held his own. He allowed just one base hit in facing a lineup that featured future big leaguers Drew Gilbert and Kyren Paris as well as high draft picks like Silas Ardoin, Brock Jones and GJ Hill.
“Playing baseball in Canada, it’s great competition, but getting to go down into the US and test myself – like playing travel ball in Georgia or going to those Future Stars Series events or any of those competitions – you get a little glimpse of success, and it almost feels like it’s impossible to do well once you get there,” Macko told FSS Plus several years later. “Once you start going around, you see they’re still players made of flesh and bone, and if you can get a little bit of success there, it gives you a little more confidence that maybe I can do this.”
Bo Naylor; C, Canada
Naylor was highly touted at the time of his 2017 International Week event appearance, and some even say the event was rescheduled to accommodate his busy schedule at the time. He’s lived up to that hype since; the Canadian-born backstop was taken by the Guardians with the 29th overall pick back in 2018 and became our first-ever alumni to reach “The Show” with a late-season call-up in 2022. “Bo” — he went by his given first name of Noah back in his amateur days — has since become a regular in the majors, playing 123 games in back-to-back years, while mostly having a defense-first reputation. However, he’s hit double-digit homers in each of his first three full seasons in the big leagues, including a new career-high of 14 in 2025. This will also mark his second appearance in the WBC, having played four games for Canada in 2023, hitting a home run along the way.
Jonathon Long; INF, Chinese Taipei
Long is knocking on the door of the big leagues with the Chicago Cubs organization, just a few years after playing for Trombly Baseball at our 2019 National Tournaments. A two-way player at the time, our scouts liked the now-23-year-old better as a hitter, and that’s a prophecy that’s also paid off; Long was described at the time as having a “solid hitting foundation with sound fundamentals and rhythm to swing…strength to swing with gap ability and power potential to the pull side. Fair actions defensively with solid range and first-step quickness.”
Michael Arroyo; INF, Colombia
Arroyo dazzled both at the plate and in the field at the 2020 World Combine, which had a heavy presence from big league scouts and high-ranking executives, and emerged as one of MLB’s Top 50 International prospects shortly thereafter. Seattle signed him for $1.3 million as an international free agent, and it’s been something of a bargain ever since given that he’s emerged as a consensus Top 100 prospect in all of baseball. He spent the second half of last year in Double-A, and at just 21 years old, could find himself emerging as a candidate for a big-league call up by the end of this season.
Erian Rodriguez; RHP, Panama
A Georgia Premier Academy standout, Rodriguez starred for the World Team at the last installment of International Week — now known as the Main Event — at Fenway Park back in 2020, and subsequently dominated in his appearance at our Pre-Draft Combine in 2021, just weeks before the Chicago Cubs took him in the 13th round of that year’s Draft. It’s been a slow, but steady climb for the righty starter since then; he’s got a 19-19 career MiLB record with a 4.53 ERA and 241 strikeouts in 258 1/3 innings of work. He earned his first taste of Double-A late last year, and is likely ticketed for a return to start the year there in 2026.
Elmer Rodriguez; RHP, Puerto Rico
The artist formerly known as “ERC” spun a few innings at Fenway Park in the first game held at a big-league park that year with fans in attendance. He struck out three batters, including one shown below of highly-regarded prospect Cam Collier, and reminisced with FSS Plus earlier this year about the event and his somewhat meteoric rise as a prospect.
“That was a cool experience,” Rodriguez-Cruz said of pitching in Fenway. “Pitching there, that was my first big league stadium I ever stepped in playing wise, so that was a fun experience. I used to look at videos of it, remember the good times. Being drafted by Boston, that was a cool moment…but you have to keep growing, take the best of everything and put it in play.”
It was to be something of a precursor of his future, having been drafted by the Boston Red Sox in the fourth round in 2021, but he was dealt to the Yankees prior to the start of the 2025 season in exchange for catcher Carlos Narvaez. He put up a monster season between High-A Hudson Valley, Double-A Somerset and Triple-A Scranton, earning Baseball America MiLB Player of the Year honors in the Yankees system, finishing 11-8 with a 2.58 ERA and 178 strikeouts in 150 innings of work.
Edwin Arroyo; INF, Puerto Rico
After a strong showing for the World Team at what was the last International Week event before the name change, Arroyo performed well, recording a hit at Fenway Park in Game 2 of the series. He was drafted by the Seattle Mariners in the second round in 2021, but was traded as part of a blockbuster package of four players to the Reds at the trade deadline in 2022 in exchange for Luis Castillo. Arroyo’s stock fell after he missed the entirety of the 2024 regular season due to a labrum injury in his shoulder, but he rebounded nicely in the Arizona Fall League later that year and performed well at Double-A Chattanooga in 2025, hitting .284 with three homers and 40 RBI and 12 stolen bases while serving as the team’s primary shortstop.
Owen Caissie; OF, Canada
Caissie, a 2025 Futures Game participant, was drafted in the second round by the San Diego Padres one year after we laid eyes on him, going 45th overall in 2020. After being dealt to the Cubs in another blockbuster deal, he subsequently made a quick ascent through Chicago’s system, hitting .286 with 22 home runs and 55 RBI before earning his first big-league call-up in mid-August, where he appeared in 12 games before a concussion ended his year prematurely.
Considered the No. 47 overall prospect in baseball by MLB Pipeline, Caissie is given 60 grades for both his throwing arm and power at the plate from the left side, which not so coincidentally exactly match the future grades that CEO and FSS founder Jeremy Booth put on him back in 2019.
While projecting then that Caissie would be an everyday big leaguer even back then, Booth wrote at the time that he “has some athletic upside and a quiet demeanor to him that says confidence,” and that at the time Caissie was “a little bit of a project, but when it comes together it’s easy to dream on; .275, 25, 90 with some swing and miss but walks as well. Will learn his zone as he plays and likely be underappreciated at times, but a grinder that helps on both sides of the ball and a winning player,” ultimately comparing him to Bobby Kielty, who enjoyed a seven-year big-league career that concluded with winning a World Series back in 2007.
The trade may also have something of a trickle-up effect in the Marlins rotation that would also involve FSS alums, with NorCal standout and FSS National Tournaments MVP Robby Snelling in line to potentially earn a spot on the staff out of camp.
Additionally, Albert Cartwright, who has provided players out of his native Bahamas at recent Future Stars Series events, will serve as an assistant coach for Great Britain at this year’s WBC, while Benji Gil, who served as our National Infield Coordinator in the early days of the company, is slated to manage Team Mexico.
Since 2003, he has covered multiple World Series and has worked high-profile events ranging from the MLB All-Star Game to the World Baseball Classic. In addition to his role working for the Future Stars Series that he's held since 2017, Ashmore currently serves as the beat writer of the Double-A New York Yankees affiliate, the Somerset Patriots, as well as national hockey writer and New York Jets game day beat reporter for The Trentonian.
A regular contributor to Baseball America, Ashmore has worked eight Super Bowls, 12 Stanley Cup Finals, the 4 Nations Face-Off, the NBA Playoffs, College Football Playoff National Championship Game, Frozen Four, Daytona 500, major UFC events and much more as he approaches 3,300 games covered in his career.
An avid trading card enthusiast, he lives with his wife, Sarah, their son, future No. 1 overall draft pick in 2042, William, their beloved dog, Bailey, and occasionally well-behaved cat, Smokey.
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