There are plenty of Guardians past and present in WBC quarterfinals 

For parts of four seasons, Cal Quantrill was a mainstay in the Cleveland Guardians’ rotation. 

And although he’s run into some career derailing struggles lately, he flashed his frontline caliber stuff on Wednesday by allowing one unearned run over five innings to help lead Team Canada to a 7-2 win. 

Quantrill wasn’t the only player with a Guardians connection to pitch in, as both Bo Naylor and Josh Naylor drove in runs in the win while Bo also stood behind the plate for Quantrill’s start. 

Team Canada is moving on to the WBC quarterfinals thanks to contributions from some former Guardians 

Quantrill’s start was him at his best, as he threw all five of his pitches to great success while allowing just two hits. He was also helped out with some strong defense from his team behind him. 

“I felt confident with the team I had behind me,” Quantrill told MLB.com’s Matt Monagan. “I attacked hitters and let them play great D. Attack the zone, make them beat us. I think we played the cleaner game today.”

The last time Quantrill took the mound for Canada in the WBC in 2023 (when he was a member of the Guardians), he allowed three runs and recorded just two outs in a loss to Great Britain. 

He turned the page from that on Wednesday despite his MLB career being in a much less secure place. 

The Naylor brother’s contributions shouldn’t be much of a surprise from Guardians fans given they had a first-row seat to them hitting in the same lineup for two-plus years before Cleveland traded Naylor away last offseason. 

Bo is hitting .308 in the WBC with a double and two RBI, while Josh is hitting .250 with two RBI and a stolen base. 

Guardians prospect Matt Wilkinson is also on Team Canada and struck out the two batters he faced in his only appearance in the Classic. 

Now Team Canada will advance to take on Team USA on Friday. It initially looked like the Americans were going to miss out on the tournament, but they snuck through thanks to Team Italy’s big win over Mexico on Wednesday. 

The Americans finished as the runner-up in Pool B while Canada won Pool A, so the Canadians will be the home team when the two teams face off. 

In other Guardians WBC news, Amed Rosario, Carlos Santana, Erik González and Junior Caminero and the Dominican Republic will face off against Korea in Friday’s first quarterfinal at 6:30 p.m.

Santana went 1-for-5 in the two games he played in Pool Play, while Caminero has slugged two huge home runs that have been the talk of the tournament. 

González’s presence on the roster is incredibly random since he hasn’t played in the bigs since 2022, but he’s managed to go 2-for-5 in the tournament with a triple.