Five days to play three games across a seemingly endless sea of streamers and networks isn’t exactly the way baseball was meant to be staged.
But you made it. And Major League Baseball’s lovable slog should get more recognizable after this seemingly eternal opening weekend.
And while the sample produced was still remarkably small, there were still a few cogent data points, many of them apparently giving signal rather than noise.
With that, USA TODAY Sports takes a look at the winners and losers of opening weekend, with another week’s worth of oversized flags and home openers upon us already:
Winners
The youth brigade
And to think No. 1 prospect Konnor Griffin’s ticket to the minor leagues might have dimmed the start of the season for prospect heads.
Nope, the kids showed out beyond anyone’s wildest dreams right from the first pitches on Thursday – such as the one Kevin McGonigle smoked for a double seconds into his major league career, part of a four-hit debut for the Detroit Tigers.
Kevvy Mac (someone has to come up with a nickname, right?) added another hit and two more RBIs in his second game, starting at both third base and shortstop. An incredibly valuable piece already for the pennant-chasing Tigers.
And while he might make the most impact on the pennant race and, maybe, the playoffs, he was arguably not the most spectacular performer at their beautillion ball.
The dynamic JJ Wetherholt homered in his debut and notched a two-run walk-off hit in his second game and got another knock in his third as the rebuilding Cardinals took a series from Tampa Bay. The Mets’ Carson Benge homered on the first pitch he saw of his MLB debut.
And while Chase DeLauter technically got his feet wet with a wild card series cameo in 2025, he scorched four homers and broke up a no-hitter in his first four games for Cleveland. Same with Owen Caissie, who enjoyed a cortado-length stay with the Cubs last summer, got traded to the Marlins and hit a walk-off two-run homer to sweep the Rockies in his Miami debut.
Konnor’s gonna have to play catch-up.
A Yankees-Blue Jays pennant race repeat
The death of the tiebreaker game can take some shine off a great divisional race. So it was last year when the Blue Jays and Yankees each won 94 games and Toronto won the division based on head-to-head record.
With the Blue Jays significantly altered yet also nursing a World Series hangover and the Yankees in apparent danger of run-it-back syndrome, it was unclear how the AL East beasts might break from the gate in 2026.
Turns out they missed nary a beat.
Both clubs registered convincing sweeps against decent but unproven opponents, as the Blue Jays got leadoff homers and walk-off hits and 21 combined punchouts from Kevin Gausman and Dylan Cease to sweep the A’s.
The Yankees, meanwhile, were in run-prevention mode in San Francisco, where the Giants are typically cooperative in such matters. Oh, Aaron Judge pounded a couple more home runs and Cam Schlittler looks very much like the playoff beast he was last year. Yeah – they’ll be fine ‘til Carlos Rodón and Gerrit Cole step back on the scene.
The Pirates, trying to win
Sometimes, fans and media alike can get a little too caught up in off-season transactions. Yet for Pittsburgh Pirates fans, screaming at management to “Do Anything” winter after winter almost always fell on deaf ears.
Finally, the Pirates did something this winter. And lo and behold, the product appears healthier!
Offseason trade acquisition Brandon Lowe pounded a pair of home runs in their opening series against a very good Mets team. Free agent signee Ryan O’Hearn – no, not a Kyle Schwarber splash but a very good acquisition – had three hits and drove in the winning run in the 10th inning as they salvaged the final game of three.
Pittsburgh took New York to extra innings in Game 2, too, with Oneil Cruz’s sun-splashed outfield debacle the only element making them non-competitive all weekend. Not to say they can stay with the Brewers and Cubs all summer.
But trying really is a lot more fun.
Japanese sluggers
They were the highest-profile hitters coming from foreign lands this winter, yet Kazuma Okamoto and Munetaka Murakami’s combined value of their contracts didn’t even reach $100 million. Contact concerns, and the worry that power in Japan would transfer to the big leagues.
Well, guess who’s trailing only DeLauter in major league home runs?
Murakami went deep thrice in Milwaukee, the bright spot in a Chicago White Sox sweep at the hands of the Brewers. Meanwhile, Okamoto had four hits in 12 at-bats, homered himself and posted a .429 OBP in his first three games for the Toronto Blue Jays.
Not a total endorsement just yet of the $60 million Toronto committed to Okamoto or the $34 million the White Sox are paying Murakami. Yet it’s a nice bit of relief for a pair of teams who rolled the dice and enjoyed positive first looks.
Losers
Rookie managers
Hey, not all of them. Beltways bros Craig Albernaz of Baltimore and Blake Butera of Washington each won their first two games, the Nationals startling the Cubs at windy Wrigley Field.
Yet it was two surprise hires – relative greenhorns – who had a rough go of it.
You’ve surely heard about Tony Vitello making the jump from collegiate ball to the majors. It’s a big deal and at the same time potentially not the big deal folks have made of it, so long as Tony V wins the usual 81 games near China Basin and doesn’t look too weird doing it.
Well, about that…
The Giants scored just one run in three games against the mighty Yankees, a series that featured a fiery pregame speech and then perhaps a little too much panic after their second shutout loss.
“We’re all major league players,” pitcher Robbie Ray said when asked whether Vitello got them too wound up. “We can handle the ups and downs.”
Stay tuned.
Meanwhile, the Los Angeles Angels’ latest see-if-this-sticks move was tossing Kurt Suzuki in the dugout after no on-field coaching experience. And giving him a one-year contract, perhaps the most cynical maneuver for an aimless franchise keeping one eye on a potential lockout.
Unlike Vitello, Suzuki’s weekend went south as a direct result of strategic button-pushing.
The Angels blew a six-run lead March 28 and a 6-4 lead a day later, his handling of starters Reid Detmers and Jack Kochanowicz and then the bullpen certainly questionable.
The Angels did come out of Houston with a split of four games. Yet this will still be a trial by fire for a guy who simply does not yet have the dugout reps.
NL West teams north and south of Vin Scully Way
They’re a combined 1-11.
The Arizona Diamondbacks suffered three particularly soul-crushing losses to the Los Angeles Dodgers, who wore their gold-lined championship togs all weekend and simply kept hitting balls over the fence, the last off Will Smith’s bat to cap the sweep.
The Giants were flattened. San Diego could not hang with the Tigers. And yes, the Rockies are winless, and it will only get more difficult for a 119-loss team that couldn’t ring in a new year with even one victory in Miami.
CB Bucknor
No, ABS was not meant to humiliate. It just works out that way sometimes.
