Here are three things we’ll be keeping an eye on around the baseball world as the 2026 season fully gets underway:
1. Opening Day Part 2:
While the 2026 season officially kicked off last night with the Yankees’ 7-0 romp over the Giants, most of the league will be starting its season today. Thursday’s games kick off at 1:15pm ET, when the Pirates take on the Mets in New York. Games will continue throughout the day before wrapping up with the Guardians facing the Mariners at 7:10pm PT in Seattle, nearly nine hours after the first game of the day. Just one matchup between division rivals is scheduled, as the Diamondbacks head to L.A. for a series against the reigning World Series Champion Dodgers.
2. Will O’Neill continue his streak?
Opening Day brings about many things each year: the start of a new baseball season, room for optimism for almost every fan base in the majors… and an opportunity for Tyler O’Neill to continue one of the wildest streaks in baseball. O’Neill has hit home runs on Opening Day for six consecutive years now, having started his streak as a member of the Cardinals in 2020 and carried through his trip through Boston and into his arrival with Baltimore. Today, he’ll look to continue that streak with the Orioles in their game against the Twins, which is scheduled for 3:05pm ET at Camden Yards. Twins ace Joe Ryan (3.42 ERA in 2025) will be on the mound for Minnesota and looking to build on his first All-Star campaign. Ryan surrendered homers on 12.1% of his fly balls both in 2025 and for his career so far, and gave up 26 total bombs last season. O’Neill is looking to rebound from an injury-wrecked season that saw him bat just .199/.292/.392 with nine home runs in 209 plate appearances.
3. Peralta to make first official Mets start:
Many fans already got a glimpse of right-hander Freddy Peralta in a Mets uniform during Spring Training, when he posted an impressive 2.70 ERA across ten frames. However, today’s matchup between the Mets and Pirates will be the first time Peralta starts a game that actually counts for his new club. His first assignment is a tough draw, as he’ll be battling reigning NL Cy Young winner Paul Skenes (1.97 ERA in 2025) while trying to suppress a new-look Pittsburgh lineup. Oneil Cruz and Bryan Reynolds return, but this time they’re surrounded by a supporting cast of offseason additions like Marcell Ozuna, Brandon Lowe, and Ryan O’Hearn. It’s a big test for the Pirates’ offense out the gate, as Peralta finished fifth in NL Cy Young voting last year after firing 176 2/3 innings with a 2.70 ERA and a 28.2% strikeout rate.
Thanks for nothing Netflix
Seek some joy.
Apparently I was not the only one unimpressed with that broadcast.
Important reminder for T-Mobile customers, this week is your chance for free MLB.TV this season ….. every team, every game.
Take advantage of it so we can keep getting this awesome benefit long into the future!
I was worried on Tuesday, as I went thru the usual steps but was issued a random error message anytime I tried to finalize. I feared we didn’t get this perk this season, knowing that the whole espn situation muddied an already convoluted and precarious perk.
Fortunately I tried again yesterday and it worked. And we get espn games this year w it too, which is neat.
Lunch – Yeah last year I was worried when T-Mobile sent out the survey asking about MLB.TV but not to worry, they have a deal in place through 2028.
IKF over Montasario today? Fire Roenicke!!! Fire Mike Port!!
Fire Wally!
Are you a T-Moblie AD guy LOL?
Astros – I’m a like-saving-money guy ;O)
I felt like they put a fog of war filter on the broadcast but then turned around and let Adobe superimpose an HD image over the banner behind home plate.
Also, I missed it because I was driving, but I read a Sports Illustrated article this morning blasting the broadcast and bemoaning the fact that they missed the first ABS challenge call because they were interviewing Vitello.
Xfinity Detroit, channel 1253 for Tiger baseball ! GO TIGERS !
The O’Neill stat is sick
Then it should see a doctor.
Stat!
$150 to MLBtv, $150 to SNY – season opener on Peacock
At first I was hating missing the Yankees game last night on Netflix but from what I’ve seen this morning, I’m fine with not seeing it.
By selling Netflix a contract to broadcast two games this year, MLB pretty much ensured that the broadcast would be trash. It sucks that the Phillies got the Field of Dreams game and it is on Netflix.
It was ugly. And I mean the broadcast. It felt someone said “Oh hey, I have an idea, since the game is in SF, we should put a fog filter on, like you’re REALLY at the game!” (even though it was clear skied)
NBC broadcast network has Mets vs. Buccos for Opening Day. New York’s local NBC is doing a 1-hour pre-game show.
That doesn’t help out of market fans
Thanks, Chuck. Can catch it using an OTA antenna like the old days.
NBC has another ballgame tonight, Dodgers vs. Braves, 8:30 Eastern/5:30 Pacific.
Find it hard to believe in this day and age you have $300 out there for baseball subscriptions and don’t have something in your space that doesn’t have NBC. Most free of all free broadcasts that you will get all year.
Probably should check your schedule now for all those national games on Saturday amd Sundays through the year now.
Steelers
“Find it hard to believe in this day and age you have $300 out there for baseball subscriptions and don’t have something in your space that doesn’t have NBC”
Nothing about that sentence was well thought out
It’s been 208 thousand minutes since the final out of the World Series. I thought about this day for each one of those minutes.
Welcome back, baseball!
How many seconds is that??
Get a calculator
Can’t afford one.
“Will O’Neill continue his streak?”
I’ll predict “no”.
You probably said that last season too. And the season before that. Baseball is a game of miracles. Never say never.
ISoab
“You probably said that last season too. And the season before that.”
Probably
“Baseball is a game of miracles. Never say never.”
Nah. It’s a game of probabilities.
Sometimes you just keep rolling sixes
Independent events.
If he goes all year injury-free then that will be the real miracle.
:waves:
I don’t claim to have any preternatural understating of baseball
Just a basic understanding of probabilities
Unless Stearns is able to sign him during the season, Peralta is a FA after this year, so I expect more great things from him. When guys are in their walk year, many of them have their best seasons and since he is already a stud, he could.win the CY.
Are you implying that some or most ballplayers are only sufficiently motivated to play at their best level during contract years??? Are you going to tell me the Easter Bunny isn’t real next ??
What about all the other ones which don’t have great years? And then sign an opt-out deal and go on to have a great year?
Or the ones that don’t? Confirmation bias doesn’t remember them.
One of the better examples I can think of was Cody Bellinger when he went from 2019 MVP to being non-tendered by the Dodgers in 2022.
A great many of them have their best or second best season ever. Some recent examples include Eduardo Rodriguez, Santander, Bader, Polanco, Jordan Montgomery, and Tyler O’Neil. There is definitely a motivational factor at play in a walk year. Guys will often play through injuries and perform better than they ever have. There are a few like Conforto who have down years, but it doesn’t happen that often.
Alonso, Adames, Buehler, Arraez, Keuchel, Fowler, etc.
I don’t know what was more surprising yesterday the fact Judge struck out four times or the fact Luis Arraez took a walk in his first at bat of the year.
BTW, how did MLBTR not report that the Yankees put Gerrit Cole on the IL to start the season?
A rare miss from MLBTR
March 19th Chucky: Yankees notes: by Anthony Franco
Cole didn’t officially go on the IL until 3/25. Same for Carlos Rodon and Anthony Volpe.
Sorry Joe Ryan, you know there’s one meatball in your repertoire today.
Go Astros!
So Tomorrow will be “Part 3” of Opening Day, with 6 teams that have yet to play a game yet……Has Opening Day ever spanned 3 days before??
It spanned a week and a half after last year’s Tokyo series
I forgot about that….thanks….but did all the rest of the teams play their games on one day after the first three of that series? yes they did, So in reality it was not a consecutive span of 3 days.
Sorry not three games but a two game series, and only the first was a season opener, then the other 28 teams all played their games on the same day……so there were only two days of opening day play last season,
True true. I wasn’t thinking of it the right way.
Part 3 tomorrow?
Jays don’t open the year until tomorrow evening
I know, that is why i asked, it will be day three of season openers…with the Rockies, Braves, Royals and Marlins, Jays and Athletics all playing their first games…….that is a span of 3 days of season opening games…..has it ever happened before was the question.
Yes. Back in the middle 90’s/early 2000’s there would be one sunday night opener and then everyone else would open monday and Tuesday
Rsox – I thought it was cool when the Reds opened the MLB season every year, but that stopped after 1994.
At least their home opener is always their first game of the season.
I remember that was the sunday night opener in 1994 against the Cardinals. After the strike they stopped getting the first game. I’m actually kind of surprised (especially with Manfred) that they’ve been able to keep opening at home every year
Rsox – Funny thing is, prior to the 1970’s the MLB season typically started in mid-April which meant you could reasonably expect decent weather conditions.
Weather-wise there’s a big difference between late March and mid-April, I wouldn’t want to attend any games in Ohio in March.
The Mets played Opening Day 1971 at Shea Stadium in what amounted to an ice storm.
I think the Blue Jays first home game featured a snow storm.
And homeruns!!
It should have been part one tonight and part two tomorrow, like it has been forever, but this stupid Netflix deal pushed the SF/NY game ahead one day to “make it special” even though it was massive pig slop.
Honestly, it didn’t seem much different than any game on ESPN over the past several years. It was pretty bare-bones in that they didn’t do much with advance stats or anything like that though. I just don’t see why Netflix wants in on live sports. Their NFL and boxing streams were bigger disasters
Because of that Netflix exclusive on Opening Night, the Yankees have Sunday off. ☹
Reminder to T-Mobile users that you can get mlb free for the whole season if you claim it this week
I can claim it but that doesn’t mean that it will actually work when I go to watch it. It almost never does.
Get a cheap HD TV streaming stick and install the app.
I will root for O’Neill to keep his streak alive today (which will probably be the only time i root for anything Orioles this season, unless they aren’t a factor in the division but are beating the Yankees)
LGM!
Happy Opening Day! The real one.
Wow, sure glad they brought up McGonigle. Javy got very excited, and we hadn’t seen those swings at outside pitches that bad for awhile. Sure looks like the a.b.s. is keeping things real. I really thought it would help Javy a lot, but the excitement of opening day I think got the better of him, I hope.
Exciting Tiger game. Javy won a challenge, then banged a single up the middle. Great one. McGonigle, 3 for 3, and thank GOD they brought him up. GO TIGERS !
It is not an exciting Astros game so far.