The World Baseball Classic is an international baseball tournament that is divided into two stages. 

The first stage is pool play. All 20 teams are divided into four pools of five teams each. Each team in a single pool will play the other four teams in its pool. The top two teams from each pool will then advance to the knockout stage, which then becomes a single-elimination, bracket-style tournament. 

Because every team in the pool play stage will play four games, there is a chance that they will have similar records. When there is no clear pool winner, the WBC has implemented a five-step tiebreaking process to set the final standings in a pool. It starts simply with looking at head-to-head, but after three stages of specific math, it could ultimately come down to drawing straws. 

Here is more on the World Baseball Classic’s tiebreaker rules in 2026. 

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World Baseball Classic tiebreaker rules

There are five ways to determine a tiebreaker in the 2026 World Baseball Classic.

• Record between tied teams
• Runs allowed per defensive outs
• Earned runs allowed per defensive outs
• Highest batting average in games between tied teams
• Draw Lots

What happens if teams finish with the same record?

If teams have the same record in the pool play stage, there are five levels of tiebreakers to go through. The first is looking at the record between tied teams when they played each other. This is the easiest tiebreaker when there are only two teams tied for the same record, because the winner is simply the head-to-head winner. 

If there are three teams tied, the same tiebreaker is used. If one of the three teams beats both of the other two, they win the tiebreaker and then it comes down to the remaining two teams’ head-to-head result. If all three teams had the same record against each other, they would need to go to the next tiebreaker level. 

This rule is explained on the WBC website.

“The team that won the games between the teams tied shall be given the higher position. If three or more teams are tied and one of those teams won its games against all other teams it is tied with, then it will be placed in the higher spot. Similarly, if one of those tied teams lost its games against all other teams it is tied with, then it will be placed in the lowest spot.”

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What happens if teams post even records against their tied opponents?

After the first tiebreaker, the process gets a little more confusing, and more math becomes involved. The way that the WBC website describes this stage is as, “The tied teams shall be ranked in the standings according to the lowest quotient of fewest runs allowed divided by the number of defensive outs recorded in the games in that round between the teams tied.”

This uses big words and makes it sound confusing. Basically, what happens is that they divide the number of runs allowed over pool play by the number of defensive outs recorded. In a sense, this is a spin on a team’s earned run average, but it takes into account all runs, whether earned or not. 

What happens if teams are tied on runs allowed per defensive outs recorded?

If that tiebreaker doesn’t resolve the issue, it is runs again, this time with only earned runs counted. So any runs involving errors are withheld.

This stage is described as, “The tied teams shall be ranked in the standings according to the lowest quotient of fewest earned runs allowed divided by the number of defensive outs recorded in the games in that round between the teams tied.”

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What happens if teams are tied on earned runs allowed per defensive outs recorded?

If tweaking the tiebreaker from runs allowed per defensive outs to earned runs allowed doesn’t solve the tiebreaker, there are only two tiebreakers left. The first is looking at the batting average in games between the tied teams. The team with the highest batting average would win the tiebreaker, and the only way this would not work is if somehow the three teams had the exact same batting averages in the games they played. 

Per the WBC website, “The tied teams shall be ranked in the standings according to the highest batting average in games in that round between the teams tied.”

Most likely, this will solve the tiebreaker, but on the extremely slim chance that it doesn’t, there is still one more tiebreaker. 

What happens if teams are tied on batting average in games between tied teams?

If teams are still tied after four stages of deep tiebreakers, it comes down to drawing lots. An example of this would be drawing straws. Essentially, there will be a group of items and one will be marked as the winner. Whichever team draws that marked item, would win the tiebreaker and advance to the knockout stage. 

According to the WBC site, “Standings shall be determined by the drawing of lots, conducted by WBCI.”

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