As the calendar turns to March every year, anticipation grows for Major League Baseball’s Opening Day. Part of the build-up to the first games of the new season are the announcements of who will be taking the mound for each team on Opening Day. This often sparks discourse amongst the baseball community, raising questions of who the right man is to start the season off on the right foot.
In reality, the Opening Day starter is a total formality. Yes, it’s an honor for any pitcher to get to open the season for their squad. It’s a turning of the page and a completely fresh start for every single team. Whatever happened the previous season, whether it ended in a World Series victory or with 100-plus losses, everyone starts at the same place on Opening Day. But often, the Opening Day starter is simply based on who is available and healthy, and there is little need for any overreaction from fans about these announcements.
Let’s start with one of our local teams. On March 14, the New York Mets announced that Clay Holmes would start their season opener at the Houston Astros. This was met with mixed reactions. The Mets signed Holmes to a three-year, $38 million contract this past offseason. The catch: Holmes has not been a starting pitcher since his rookie season with the Pittsburgh Pirates in 2018. He transitioned to a bullpen role in 2019, and continued in this role after joining the New York Yankees in 2021, eventually becoming their closer. When the Mets inked his contract, they also announced that they signed him to be a starter, and Holmes is now converted to a role in the starting rotation in Queens. During spring training, Holmes was very impressive, ending his spring with a 0.93 earned run average, raising hopes that Holmes would have a successful transition to being a big-league starter once again.
It’s understandable why fans would be unsure about Holmes starting the first game of the Mets’ 2025 season. He’s new to the role, and Yankee fans recall the anxiety they experienced when Holmes came in in the ninth inning, as he was not always the shutdown closer they wanted. However, when you look at the rest of the Mets’ options in the starting rotation, it becomes easier to grasp why this decision was made. Perhaps, if he wasn’t on the Injured List with a right oblique issue, Sean Manaea would have been chosen. He had one of his best career seasons last year for New York and was a crucial part of their rotation, posting a 3.47 ERA in 32 games. Perhaps if Kodai Senga had not dealt with shoulder and calf injuries that forced him to make only one start in 2024 after a stellar 2023 season, he would have gotten the ball. The reality of the Mets is that their rotation is dealing with injuries and has several new faces, so there was no layup answer for who got the ball in the opener. Holmes wound up tossing 4.2 innings and giving up three runs on Opening Day, not a fantastic performance by any means but not anything for the Mets to immediately panic over.
On the other side of town, the Yankees had Carlos Rodón on the mound for their opener at home against the Milwaukee Brewers. The Yankees normally would have had Gerrit Cole out on the mound on Day 1, who has started four Opening Days in pinstripes, but he will miss the entire 2025 season after getting Tommy John surgery on his pitching elbow. Rodón has had an up-and-down Yankees tenure, struggling mightily with a 6.85 ERA in 2023 before bouncing back with a 3.96 ERA last year. Cole certainly would’ve been more of a sure thing, but the Opening Day starter is all about picking the best option of what you have. In a sense, the Yankees rewarded Rodón’s solid 2024 campaign by giving him the ball for the 2025 opener.
This is all to say that no one should be reading too much into Opening Day starter statistics. The 162-game season is long, and there is plenty of time for things to change before the push for October. While impressive performances around the league, especially MacKenzie Gore’s six scoreless innings with 13 strikeouts, feel like the best way to start off on the right foot, there is so much more to come. And isn’t that the real gift of Opening Day?
