When a Team Italy player hits a home run, he dons an Armani jacket and takes a shot of espresso (and don't forget the kiss on each cheek from the team captain).
Forget the game ball given to the player who made the biggest difference; in this clubhouse, there's a game bottle of wine. And all of it is set to a soundtrack of Andrea Bocelli, the legendary Italian opera singer.
This is Team Italy, the unlikely underdog of the World Baseball Classic, whose celebrations and gioia di vivere have charmed baseball fans far beyond the shores of the Mediterranean. And their unexpected success on the field — undefeated in pool play, including a stunning 8-6 win over Team USA on Tuesday — means they have as clear a path to a title as any of their competitors.
"There's another team in the world that can play baseball," said Italian manager Francisco Cervelli this week. "This tournament is so amazing because everybody expected only four teams to make it. But when you get this kind of surprise, the game grows globally."
Now, the Azzurri — aka the Blues, so-called for the traditional Savoy blue of the Italian national team uniforms — are headed to the quarterfinals, where they could surpass their best-ever finish in the event's history with a win over Puerto Rico on Saturday.
None of it is happening by chance, not the wins nor the social media love. Team Italy is wise to the platform of the World Baseball Classic, the biggest stage in international baseball. The team's performance is both an advertisement to the world for Italian baseball and an advertisement back home for the sport itself.
"This time could be really the turning point of our sport in Italy," said Marco Mazzieri, the president of the Italian Baseball Federation, speaking to NPR.
The espresso, the Armani jacket, the operatic victory themes — all the way down to the Italian olive oils some team staff brought over for the players to have with bruschetta, according to Italian-American infielder Jon Berti, who played last season with the Chicago Cubs — is all organic, the team says. But they are leaning into it, unafraid to maximize their moment in the spotlight.
"With the new generation, you cannot explain the history of Italy in two hours," Cervelli said in an interview with NPR. "You got to explain it with the coffee, with the good food, with the dress. And that's it, now they get interested."
Compared to other international sporting competitions, like the Olympics, the World Baseball Classic has more relaxed qualification requirements in order to foster more competitive teams. As a result, many rosters include international players.
It's no secret that most of Team Italy's players are Italian-American. Of the 30 players on the roster, 24 were born in the U.S., while only three were born in Italy.
Pasquantino, who was born in Virginia, says he is not "naive" about playing for Italy as an American. The Kansas City Royals first baseman traces his Italian heritage through his paternal grandfather, whose family name was once Pasquantonio before their immigration to the U.S. (A column in the Italian newspaper Corriere della Sera published after the upset win over the U.S. attributed "much of this epic victory" to the elder Pasquantino, Denny, who encouraged his grandson to play for Italy.)
Pasquantino first visited Italy in 2022 as part of a trip organized by MLB Hall of Famer and former Italy manager Mike Piazza. Since then, he has been instrumental in recruiting fellow players and helping the two sides of the team — the Italians and the Italian-Americans — bond in their short time together, starting with the flight together from spring training.
"I've never seen anything like what happened on that plane. Just Andrea Bocelli bumping on the speaker, everyone singing it at the top of their lungs, nobody sitting in their seats," said Chicago White Sox catcher Kyle Teel. "It was unbelievable."
The long-term goal for Team Italy, Pasquantino says, is for the roster to be composed of native-born Italians, rather than Americans like him.
"The goal is to open that door and show, hey, Italy has got some ball players, and all you have to do is invest in them a little bit," he told reporters this month.
Baseball is about as Italian as tacos. There, soccer is the king of sports; tennis, Formula 1, basketball and even volleyball are all more popular than America's pastime. Italy's domestic baseball league has been racked by financial challenges in recent decades.
"Not having a baseball culture and not seeing and watching baseball on TV makes it very hard for us … to attract those kids into playing baseball," said Marco Mazzieri, a former Italian professional baseball player who's now the president of the Italian Baseball Federation.
As a result, opportunities for youth players are limited. By the time an American player turns 15, he might have played 300 games already, he explained, while an Italian of the same age may have only played in 40 games. "We have good players, we just don't play enough," Mazzieri said.
The short-term goal, then, was a Cinderella run through the tournament that could help shine a spotlight on baseball in Italy to help the sport grow.
"We need to put Italy on the map," Cervelli said before Italy's first game. "If we get good results, a lot of things happen. We are going to open a lot of eyes and opportunities."
But that wasn't a sure thing. There are 22 MLB All-Stars on the roster of the United States national baseball team. The Dominican Republic has 16. Venezuela, a dozen. Italy? Just two. And their placement in a tough pool alongside the U.S. and Mexico meant they would have to oust either the U.S. or Mexico, both of which were favored over Italy to advance.
Instead, Italy is undefeated, the top team in the tough Pool B and the first European team ever to go unbeaten in pool play in the World Baseball Classic.
Their run so far has earned the team TV coverage plus supportive columns and full-page features in Italy's most-read newspapers, Corriere della Sera and La Gazzetta dello Sport. Speaking in Parliament this week, Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni name-checked the team's upset over the Americans.
That attention could perhaps result in more government funding for the federation, officials hope, and winning games could mean more television broadcasts and more lucrative sponsorships, like one announced earlier this year with the insurance company Allianz. On the horizon, of course, is baseball's return to the Olympics in 2028.
For now, it's too early to think about all that, said Cervelli. His phone has been buzzing "nonstop" with texts and calls since the win over the U.S. — "probably one of the best days of my life," he said.
"If we keep winning, it's going to continue. That's what we're looking for. I'm going to charge my phone and be ready for that," he joked.
One of the three Italian-born players on the roster is pitcher Sam Aldegheri. Born in Verona, Aldegheri became the first pitcher born and raised in Italy to reach the major leagues when he debuted for the Los Angeles Angels in 2024.
When the Italian national anthem played before their opening game versus Brazil, Aldegheri got goosebumps, he said afterward. As the starter, he pitched four and two-thirds scoreless innings; after the 8-0 win, he fought off tears in a post-game interview. Now he is set to start again in Saturday's quarterfinal matchup against Puerto Rico.
"Baseball is not really a thing in Italy. It's slowly growing," Aldegheri said this week. "[To] play for your country is something that you can't really explain, but you can feel it, feel all the support from back home. It's amazing."
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