Why This Team Can Make Noise: Japan, the king of international baseball, is the only country to win the WBC multiple times. Samurai Japan outscored its pool-play opponents by 30 runs and went undefeated in the last tournament, and now it gets Seiya Suzuki in the lineup after he was injured during the previous competition. The rotation will look different and not quite as deep this time around — Shohei Ohtani will only be hitting, and Roki Sasaki, Shota Imanaga and Yu Darvish will not be participating — but there are still plenty of MLB and NPB stars intact for manager Hirokazu Ibata to lead Japan to its fourth WBC championship. For White Sox and Blue Jays fans who might have missed the 2023 WBC, the tournament should be an entertaining showcase for Munetaka Murakami — whose walk-off double sent Japan past Mexico in the 2023 WBC semifinals — and Kazuma Okamoto before the NPB standouts embark on their big-league careers.

The Top Player(s): Some guy named … Ohtani? He was the tournament MVP after striking out Mike Trout to lead Japan to victory, and even if he won’t be able to help on the mound this time, the four-time MVP will remain an imposing presence in the box coming off back-to-back 50-homer MVP seasons with the Dodgers. Yoshinobu Yamamoto, who struck out 12 of the 27 batters he faced in the 2023 WBC, will be coming off World Series MVP honors and an All-Star season with the Dodgers as he leads Japan’s pitching staff. There’s also plenty of NPB talent to keep an eye on, including reigning Sawamura Award winner Hiromi Itoh and Central League MVP Teruaki Sato, who hit 40 homers in NPB last season. Also worth monitoring: New Astros pitcher Tatsuya Imai, who’s coming off a career year in NPB, is not on the initial roster but is part of the designated pitcher pool and could be added in later rounds if (when) Japan advances.

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