“Play Ball!” Opening Day 2025 and a New MLB Season Are Here

The 2025 MLB season is upon us! Of the several major U.S. sports, baseball’s Opening Day is the most anticipated, revered and satisfying. For the biggest fans, it means seven months of following their favorite teams in day games, night games, weekends, holidays and all through summer. It’s tradition, and only baseball season offers it so well. Typically, MLB likes to get things going with all 30 teams competing on Opening Day. This year, it will be a little different for a few reasons:

The Los Angeles Dodgers and the Chicago Cubs kicked off the regular MLB season on March 18th with a two-game series at the Tokyo Dome in Japan.
The 2025 MLB season Opening Day for the entire League is March 27th, the earliest in MLB history. The Dodgers and the Cubs will be in action too, marking their second Opening Day of the new season.
However, two teams—the Colorado Rockies and the Tampa Bay Rays—will miss the March 27th Opening Day and begin the season the next day. Why? Because Tropicana Field was damaged by a hurricane last year. The Rays are playing the 2025 season at the George M. Steinbrenner Field in Tampa, where the Yankees play their Spring Training games, and they needed an extra day to get it ready for a proper opening day.

There are rule changes for 2025.

MLB has modified two existing rules to promote fair play and discourage teams from bending those rules, making the price for breaking them harsher. One modification is to the defensive shift and the other is baserunning.

Shift violators, beware! The penalty is an automatic base for the batter.

MLB and nearly all baseball fans loved how the removal of the shift brought renewed life and action to the game while significantly shortening the average game time. Still, the League felt it was time to get tougher on a defensive team that violates the rule. Last season, a shift violation would result in an automatic “ball” awarded to the batter. In 2025, the batter will be awarded first base, and baserunners will advance. The violating infielder will be charged with an error. NOTE: Just two shift violations were actually called all last season. The new rule just might cut that number in half.

Runners gotta run. No more “abandoning.”

We’re used to seeing a batter run full speed and through first base, trying to beat out the throw. That’s legal. We’re not supposed to see a runner go through the second base bag trying to beat out a throw. But last year, some teams were having runners do that…with success. They’d do it with men on third, first, and with two outs. On a grounder, the runner on first would try to beat out the play at second by running through the bag. If that runner was safe, the runner on third would be safe when he crossed the plate. Sure, the runner on second would then be tagged out, but the run had counted before the third out was made.

No more in 2025. The umpire now has the discretion to call the runner at second out for “abandonment” because the runner, in the ump’s judgment, was neither trying to stop at second nor round the bag and head for third. So, with the rule change, the runner at home would no longer be safe no matter what happened at second base.

Introducing the Sacramento A’s.

Some might call it a Capital crime: The former Oakland A’s are set to play the 2025 season in the city of Sacramento, the capital of California, 81 miles from their former home. However, this is just a layover; the team is supposedly bound for Las Vegas, hoping to move into a city and new stadium in 2028. Their temporary home is Sutter Health Park, the home of the Sacramento River Cats of the Pacific Coast League. The good news is that the A’s have already sold out their season tickets for the 2025 campaign. The stadium’s capacity is only 14,000, with only about 10,500 permanent seats. Still, Sacramento fans are eager to have another professional team other than the Kings of the NBA. The A’s will just be that…not the Sacramento A’s.

New managers at the helm.

One typical way teams hope to improve their fortunes is with new leadership. A handful of teams made big moves in the dugout by hiring new skippers:

Will Venable, Chicago White Sox. After their dismal record-breaking losing season last year, the White Sox announced they’ve hired Will Venable to manage the team. It will be Venable’s first time as a skipper.
Clayton McCullough, Miami Marlins. In 2023, Marlins Manager Skip Schumacher led the team to the playoffs and was named NL Manager of the Year. But he resigned after the end of last season and a 100-loss year. The team named Clayton McCullough their new leader. McCullough has been the first base coach for the Los Angeles Dodgers the past four seasons, so he knows what winning looks like.
Terry Francona, Cincinnati Reds. The Reds, who had high hopes for the 2024 season, fired six-year manager David Bell with five games left. Soon afterward, they named seasoned skipper Terry “Tito” Francona to lead the team. This will be Francona’s 24th season as a manager. He managed the Guardians (Indians) for 11 seasons before stepping down in 2024 for health reasons. The idea of managing the Reds seemed to make him feel better.

New stars in the lineup.

A handful of talent was traded or acquired during the off-season, making headlines:

Juan Soto to the New York Mets. It’s only 9.5 miles from Yankee Stadium to Citi Field, but news about Juan Soto’s move to the Mets from the Yankees traveled far and fast. His new team and new $765 million contract have put the National League’s New York team in the spotlight.
Alex Bregman to the Boston Red Sox. Alex Bregman, who was with Houston for nine seasons, always had good stats in games against the Boston Red Sox. That may work well for the Red Sox right as Bregman joins the team. He brings playoff and World Series experience to Boston’s lineup.
Corbin Burnes to the Arizona Diamondbacks. The former Cy Young winner (2021) and four-time All-Star returns to the National League after a one-year stint with the Orioles, where he racked up 15 wins. He joins a strong D-backs rotation that needs more firepower to challenge the Dodgers in the NL West.
Blake Snell to the Los Angeles Dodgers. Roki Sasaki signs on too. In nine seasons, Snell has won more than 10 games just twice, but both times he was a League leader in ERA and won the Cy Young Award. The Dodgers, whose starting rotation suffered last year, moved to bolster the staff. They also added young Japanese pitching phenom Roki Sasaki before the season. Sasaki joins Shohei Ohtani and Yoshinobu Yamamoto, two Japanese stars added last year.
Max Fried, Devin Williams, Paul Goldschmidt and Cody Bellinger to the New York Yankees. Soto left the Bronx Bombers, so the Yankees got busy in the off-season. Goldschmidt has been the best of the new players, but Bellinger, a former Rookie of the Year and MVP with the Dodgers, also had two good seasons with the Cubs. Starting pitcher Fried and reliever Williams could help the Yankees this season, who just lost ace Gerrit Cole for the season.
Kyle Tucker to the Cubs. Kyle Tucker comes to the Windy City with great expectations. Even with a season interrupted by injury (he played only 79 games), he hit .289 and belted 23 home runs. His move to the Cubs helps replace the loss of Bellinger. Tucker is a three-time All-Star with extensive playoff experience, which the Cubs could use.

Last season is history. It’s a whole new year with new rules, managers and players. Anything is possible in 2025, which is why every fan is hopeful and Opening Day has special meaning, like every Opening Day before it.

Resources: youtube.com/Andrew_ Andrew_Roy/interesting_facts-2025; sports.yahoo.com/mlb-offseason-review-how-biggest-moves-will-impact; apnews.com/article/cincinnati-reds-terry-francona; baseball-reference.com; cbssports.com/mlb/news/10-notable-mlb-players-coming-back-from-injuries;en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2025 _Major_League_Baseball_season