Opening Day is Here!

Photo Credit: Jeff Roberson/Associated Pres

Today is the day we baseball nuts wait for all winter. The Major League Baseball Season opens up with three games on tap.

At 1:05, the St. Louis Cardinals play the Pittsburgh Pirates at PNC Park with Adam Wainwright taking the mound for the first time since Tommy John surgery. He will go up against Francisco Liriano, who was 12-7 and the ace of the team last season.

In the second game, at 4:05, the Tampa Bay Rays host the Toronto Blue Jays in Tropicana Field. Marcus Stroman, who missed most of last year with a knee injury will take on Chris Archer, who is expected to be the ace of the Rays staff.

The third game, at 8:37, is a replay of last year’s World Series. The New York Mets and their ace, Matt Harvey against the Kansas City Royals and Edinson Volquez. All three games are on National Television. Five of the six teams in the Opening Day Games made it to the Post Season last year, with the Rays the only exception.

There has been a proposal to make Opening Day a National Holiday as a large portion of the American public take the day off anyway to see the spectacle. Whether that happens or not, Opening Day will always mean full houses for all but few teams.

This is the first year in the last seven that I have not been physically present at an Opening Day. Last year, I was in Tampa’s Tropicana Field for Opening Day between the Rays and the Baltimore Orioles. The Orioles won that one 6-2, beating Archer in front of 31,042 fans. The next day, the Orioles won again 6-5 and there were only 13,906 fans present.

The previous year, 2014, we were in Chase Field in Phoenix for the Opener between the Arizona Diamondbacks and eventual World Series winning San Francisco Giants. With 48,541 fans on hand, the Diamondbacks lost the opener 9-8 on a Buster Posey two-run homer in the top of the ninth. The next day, the Giants got off to a 4-0 lead in the first inning against none other than Wade Miley. After giving up the four runs in the first, Miley then shut out the Giants for six more innings as the D’Backs came back to win 5-4.

The crowd that day was only 18,974. Obviously, the magic of Opening Day goes away quickly in some ball parks in different cities. Not everyone can sell out almost every day like the Boston Red Sox do.

If you have never seen an Opening Day, with its pageantry and drama, you are missing something that every baseball fan should experience at least once. There is usually a special event scheduled for that day in every ball park, but watching the introduction of the players and the teams lining up on the base lines to start the season is worth the trip.

Also worth noting: since this is an even numbered year and the San Francisco Giants have won the World Series in the last three even numbered years, fans will be watching them closely. 

By the end of the day on Monday, if the weather is good, every team will have at least one game under its belt. But with 161 more to go, we will be no closer to being able to predict the ultimate winner. At the end, there will be ten teams in the Post Season.