HOUSTON — Running in from the bullpen for his biggest outing yet, Canada’s Matt Wilkinson took in his surroundings at Daikin Park, scanned the largest crowd he’d ever pitched in front of and simply went to work.
Yet to throw a pitch above high-A in the Cleveland Guardians system, the 23-year-old lefty from Ladner, B.C., attacked a powerhouse American lineup without fear or favour at the World Baseball Classic. He ended up throwing two shutout innings, striking out Cal Raleigh and Bryce Harper in the process, during Canada’s 5-3 quarter-final loss.
“The biggest crowd I pitched in before this was when I was 12 at the Little League World Series — it’s a surreal moment,” he said. “It sucks right now because we lost. But looking back at it a couple years down the road, I think it’s going to help me in my career going through the minor leagues. I still have a bunch of stuff to work on, but it’s a stepping stone and I’m excited to get back to spring training.”
Tugboat, as Wilkinson has been known since his dad’s best friend Phil McNeil bestowed the nickname on him during his mosquito baseball days, is one of several national-team players whose development was turbo-charged over the past couple of weeks.
Between that group, the country’s established big-leaguers and another layer of promising minor-league prospects working their way up, there’s reason to believe this year’s run to the quarterfinals is a beginning for the national team at the tournament, rather than an end.
“To do what they did against one of the best lineups baseball’s probably ever seen, it’s so special,” Michael Soroka said of Wilkinson and Micah Ashman, the 23-year-old double-A lefty in the Baltimore Orioles system who added 2.1 shutout innings against the U.S.
“They were joking about it, they get to go back to Field 6 and it doesn’t matter who they face next, they know they’ve got the stuff to get outs. We knew going into it they had what it took. But now there’s no doubt for themselves. They get to run forward from here.”
The same applies to the program as a whole.
Soroka, Tyler O’Neill, Josh and Bo Naylor, Abraham Toro, Otto Lopez, Edouard Julien and Cal Quantrill are established big-leaguers at the forefront of a core that’s formed from the wreckage of the 2017 Classic, when Canada went 0-3.
Bolstering them now are Owen Caissie, Denzel Clarke, Tyler Black, Liam Hicks and Jared Young, who are at the beginning of their big-league careers. Adam Macko, Eric Cerantola, Wilkinson and Ashman are working their way up to The Show, while a slew of prospects who weren’t on this edition of the national team, like Jonah Tong, Mitch Bratt, Tristan Peters, David Calabrese, Garrett Hawkins, Carter Loewen, Sam Shaw, Nathan Flewelling, Tim Piasentin, Calvin Ziegler, Emilien Pitre, Myles Naylor and Charles Davalan, are on the move, too.
Add in Nick Pivetta, Jordan Romano, Cade Smith, Matt Brash, Erik Sabrowski and Charles Leblanc — Canadians who, for different reasons, weren’t able to join up this time — and the pool will be much deeper for director of national teams Greg Hamilton next time.
“It would be awesome” if more of them come out next time, said Josh Naylor. “Every individual has their own reasoning on why they are or are not here. It’s hard to judge them. Some guys are fighting for jobs. Some guys have been through injuries from past seasons. But hopefully, (the quarterfinal run) does inspire a few guys to come out next time, we can use everyone we can.”
Indeed. More national-team success, along with strong Toronto Blue Jays teams, only compounds the impact as their results help produce future generations of players.
“It gets people a little bit more excited to go to the ball fields and pick up a ball and a bat and play ball,” said manager Ernie Whitt. “And we see growth in our baseball academies that are going on, different camps and clinics. The growth is there.
“As we grow, the players will also grow. I mean, we’ve got a lot of Canadian players that are playing in college, and they’re chasing their dream of trying to become a big-league player. But again, it starts at the grassroots, getting them the proper training, the techniques and the understanding of how difficult it is to play this game.”
The World Baseball Classic was a crash course in that for Wilkinson, who first gained fame at the 2015 Little League World Series, when he struck out 16 over five innings for the White Rock team representing Canada in a 1-0, extra-inning loss to Mexico.
Cleveland drafted him out of Central Arizona with its 10th-round pick in 2023. After an eye-popping 174 strikeouts in 118.2 innings with a 1.12 ERA between low-A and high-A in 2024, his numbers slid last year when he struck out 117 in 104 innings with a 4.24 ERA.
“I had a rough year last year, I kind of needed it, I got humbled a little bit,” said Wilkinson, who overcomes pedestrian low-90s velocity with a low release point and high induced vertical break. “I had to get back to my strengths, back to Year 1, when I was just competing the best I could do. … This has been a great opportunity to play up a higher level of baseball. To be able to strike out some MVP candidates and stuff like that, I wouldn’t say it’s a dream come true, but just like a good reality check of how good my stuff is.”
Wilkinson spent plenty of time talking to the veteran Canadian arms, fellow Ladner native James Paxton chief among them, underlining the full-circle nature of the national team. Coaches like Justin Morneau, Russell Martin, Stubby Clapp, Paul Quantrill and Denis Boucher are all products of the program they now coach.
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Current players work to nurture and train their younger teammates, too.
“We talked a lot daily about confidence, playing the game through and through until the last out, never-kind-of-give-up attitude and really be a professional, take care of your day from beginning to end and good things will happen,” said Josh Naylor.
“So hopefully they take away all the little lessons learned from some older guys, from some coaches. I know I take a lot away from everyone here, young or older than me, I don’t really care, I try to observe and learn the best I can and try to add that to my game and become a better player at the end of the day.”
Added O’Neill: “Just such a great group of guys that we have. Our chemistry is really good. We’ve played with each other a lot. Most of us have been on this team before, so just to see the boys again and be a part of this, represent the Maple Leaf, it’s always an honour to be out here. We came further than we ever have in the past and just wish we made it even further than that.”
That’s the new bar for Canada, one they’ll try to clear at the next World Baseball Classic, whenever that will be.
