Major League Baseball fully opened up its 2024 season on Thursday, just over a week after the Los Angeles Dodgers and San Diego Padres kicked off the schedule with a two-game set in Seoul, South Korea. CBS Sports provided running analysis throughout the day's 13 games (Mets-Brewers and Phillies-Braves were rained out). You can revisit all of that coverage below.
In addition to that, we here at CBS Sports have also marked the day by highlighting several "winners" and "losers" from Opening Day. Let's get to those now, shall we?
Winner: Orioles
The Orioles were the first team to take the field on Thursday. They were the first team to record a win, too, dominating the Angels by an 11-3 final.
New ace Corbin Burnes surrendered one run on one hit over six innings of work, all the while striking out 11 batters and walking none. Every starting position player except one recorded a hit, and catcher Adley Rutschman combined with outfielders Anthony Santander and Cedric Mullins to plate nine runs over the course of the afternoon.
The Orioles, a trendy preseason pick to win the AL pennant, also ushered in the David Rubenstein ownership era in grand fashion.
Loser: Mike Trout
Trout is no stranger to having his individual excellence obscured by a rough Angels team result. It's only fitting then that the first game post-Ohtani featured that exact formula: Trout homered in his first at-bat of the season, against new Orioles ace Corbin Burnes, only to see the Angels lose to the Orioles by an 11-3 final.
We wish we could muster some optimism that better times wait ahead for Trout and these Angels. We cannot. It's going to be a long year.
Winner: Juan Soto
As fathers across the country have made a point of saying: you only get one chance at a first impression. Soto took advantage of his virgin voyage with the Yankees on Thursday, showing off in a win against the Astros.
Soto recorded only one hit, an RBI single in the fifth to get the Yankees on the board, but he walked twice and even made a key defensive play in the ninth. That's when he threw out Mauricio Dubón as he attempted to score the game-tying run. Take a look:
The Yankees and Astros will continue their four-game series, a potential ALCS preview, on Friday.
Loser: Astros bullpen
The Astros saw the winds of change rearrange their bullpen over the winter. Phil Maton, Ryne Stanek, and Hector Neris left through free agency while Josh Hader arrived using the same method, pushing Ryan Pressly down the pecking order. Factor in Bryan Abreu's suspension for hitting Adolis García with a pitch during the playoffs, and new manager Joe Espada couldn't just roll out the same old familiar sequence as his predecessor Dusty Baker had in the past.
It may not have worked anyway on Thursday.
Espada went to the bullpen during the fifth inning, calling upon Seth Martinez to finish the frame after Framber Valdez let three runs score. He did that. Espada then turned to Rafael Montero and Pressly over the next two innings. They combined to allow two runs on three hits and a walk, allowing the tying and go-ahead runs in the process.
Espada eventually received clean sheets from Tayler Scott and Hader. By then, the Astros trailed by 5-4, or the eventual final score.
Winner: Dodgers' superteam status
We already got our first couple of looks at the Dodgers' MVP Three -- that is, Mookie Betts, Shohei Ohtani, and Freddie Freeman -- last week, during their season-opening two-game set against the Padres in Seoul, South Korea. Still, the collective made its debut in front of the home Dodgers crowd on Thursday, and did not disappoint.
Rather, the trio combined to record six hits and four RBI in a win against the Cardinals. That included an Ohtani double and home runs from Betts and Freeman.
The Dodgers also received a better start from offseason addition Tyler Glasnow than the one he put forth last week. He yielded one run in six innings, striking out five batters and allowing two hits and a walk.
Loser: Midwestern farmers
Cardinals right-hander Miles Mikolas raised eyebrows earlier this spring when he compared and contrasted St. Louis' roster-building strategies to that of the Dodgers.
"We're not exactly a low payroll team, but you got the Dodgers playing checkbook baseball," he told reporters, including MLB.com's John Denton. "We're going to be the hardest working group of Midwestern farmers we can be. … It would be great to stick it to the Dodgers."
It was one game and all, but Thursday marked a poor day for Mikolas and his band of Midwestern farmers. He surrendered five runs on seven hits and two walks in 4 1/3 innings. The Cardinals lineup, for their part, scored one run on three hits.
"Money talks, right?" Mikolas said after the game, according to the Belleville News-Democrat's Jeff Jones. "I ended up on the losing side of that one. But, you know, talk a little smack here and there, I don't think there's anything wrong with that. Poking fun at a little bit of this, little bit of that and I ended up on the wrong side of it this time. Maybe next time I end up on the right side of it. If I can get that 51/49, I'll take it."
Winner: Nick Martini
Part of the beauty of baseball is that you never know who is going to fill the role of hero on any given day. Oftentimes, it's the stars; sometimes, it's the fringe players.
Nick Martini, a 33-year-old journeyman with his sixth organization, made the Reds Opening Day roster following injuries to TJ Friedl and Matt McLain and suspension to Noelvi Marte. He'd previously homered eight times in 141 big-league games. It would be fair to write that he was one of the players least likely to notch MLB's first multi-homer game of the year. That's why they play the games.
Indeed, Martini launched a pair of home runs and drove in five runners while serving as Cincinnati's DH and No. 8 hole hitter in a victory against the Nationals.
Loser: Untimely injuries
Opening Day was not free, alas, of unfortunate injuries. Twins third baseman Royce Lewis injured his quad while running the basepaths, requiring him to exit a game that he had already homered in. Later on, Cubs ace Justin Steele left with an apparent hamstring injury after fielding a bunt in the fifth inning of his start against the Rangers. At least Steele and Lewis made it into their respective games. Nationals third baseman Nick Senzel had to be scratched from the lineup just before first pitch after fracturing his thumb on a ground ball during pregame warmups.
Here's hoping all three make quick recoveries.
Winner: AL Central lefty starters
The AL Central isn't the most stacked division, but they sent three young intriguing left-handed starters to the mound on Thursday: Detroit's Tarik Skubal, Kansas City's Cole Ragans, and Chicago's Garrett Crochet. Each delivered a quality start.
Skubal threw six shutout innings against the White Sox, surrendering three hits and no walks while punching out six batters. He coerced 20 swinging strikes on the afternoon, including 10 on his four-seam fastball. On a related note, Skubal's heater got up to 98.9 mph.
Crochet, Skubal's counterpart, did his part to keep the White Sox in the game. He held the Tigers to one run on five hits and no walks. He struck out eight batters and induced 11 whiffs. He also showed the arm strength that once made him a top draft pick, with his heater maxing out at 99.8 mph. This marked Crochet's first professional start.
Then there was Ragans, one of the breakout players of the second half last season. He struck out nine batters in six innings against the Twins, though he did give up two runs on five hits and three walks.
Say this for the AL Central: they could have some very fun young lefties worth tracking throughout the season.
Loser: The NL East
Maybe this is a reach, but we like to make full use of our creative license when we can.
Anyway, Opening Day was probably less enjoyable if you were a fan of the Braves, Phillies, or Mets -- the top three teams in the NL East. That's because their contests were postponed on Wednesday because of expected inclement weather. Those teams will instead get their seasons underway on Friday.
The other NL East teams, the Nationals and Marlins, both opened their years as scheduled on Thursday. They both lost, with the Nationals going down in nine innings to the Reds and the Marlins requiring 12 innings to lose to the Pirates.
Winner: The Diamondbacks
Think the reigning NL champions were ready to start the season? They exploded in the third inning against the Rockies, plating 14 runs, which qualified as the fourth most for a team in a single frame since 1900, according to MLB.com's Sarah Langs. It's also the most in an inning during an Opening Day contest.
Lourdes Gurriel Jr. drove in five runs on his own, but Gabriel Moreno (three), Christian Walker (2), and Eugenio Suárez (2) will each enter the season's second day with multiple RBI.
Winner: Tyler O'Neill's Opening Day streak
O'Neill made history, albeit of the obscure kind. In his first game with the Red Sox organization, he homered on his fifth Opening Day in a row. He had previously been in a four-way tie for the longest such streak of all time. You can read more about O'Neill's accomplishment here.
Loser: Potentially the two worst teams in baseball
You can't write much other than "ouch" to describe the Rockies' Opening Day. The Rockies were down 2-1 entering the bottom of the third inning. They then surrendered 14 runs as part of a meltdown half-inning that lasted a half hour. There are 161 more games to go, but you can't hold it against any Rockies fan who felt their excitement for the new year drain with every run scored on Thursday night.
Meanwhile, in Oakland, the Athletics were one of two teams shut out on Opening Day (the White Sox being the other). To add insult to injury, the A's posted their goose egg in front of a sparse crowd of fewer than 14,000 people -- the result of a boycott aimed at owner John Fisher, who is in the midst of attempting to relocate the franchise to Las Vegas, Nevada. This is, by all indications, going to be a long and difficult year for the A's and their fan base. Thursday, then, set the right tone.
2024 MLB Opening Day scores
Every Opening Day game was available streaming on Fubo (Try for free. Regional Restrictions may apply).
- Orioles 11, Angels 3 (Box score)
- Tigers 1, White Sox 0 (Box score)
- Twins 4, Royals 1 (Box score)
- Yankees 5, Astros 4 (Box score)
- Pirates 6, Marlins 5 (Box score)
- Padres 6, Giants 4 (Box score)
- Dodgers 7, Cardinals 1 (Box score)
- Blue Jays 8, Rays 2 (Box score)
- Reds 8, Nationals 2 (Box score)
- Rangers 4, Cubs 3 (Box score)
- Guardians 8, Athletics 0 (box score)
- Red Sox 6, Mariners 4 (box score)
- Diamondbacks 16, Rockies 1 (box score)
You can relive CBS Sports' live blog coverage below.