Opening Day 2026

As I mentioned yesterday in the re-boot post, Thursday was MLB's Opening Day. What a glorious thought!

And for me, personally, it was time to renew a time-honored practice of mine that goes back to 1990. I was home to watch all the action. This year, one of my two gray tabby cats, Scottie, was on-hand to enjoy the festivities with me.

More on my Opening Day tradition in a moment.

No matter who your team is, I hope you won on Opening Day. And, well, if you didn't, the beauty of baseball is there is always another game tomorrow!

For those of us in Braves Country, we will experience Opening Day later than most. The Braves open the 2026 season at home, tonight, vs. Kansas City. The hopes and dreams of a new slate of 162 games begin, again, at approximately 7:15 p.m. EDT.

When I exchanged my post-season projections with a friend of mine (another annual tradition), I placed the Braves just outside of post-season contention. The combination of injuries to starting pitchers and the inability to sign any free agent reinforcements leaves the ball club a little thin in this category. It's hard for me to see how they would overcome some of the top teams in the league, let alone their own division rivals.

But, as I say every year, everyone is undefeated on Opening Day. You just never know.

Back to my Opening Day tradition...

It all started back when I was a junior public relations manager early in my career. A very eager colleague from one of the local television stations--who happened to be home from work that day--offered to call me every hour (on the hour) with game updates. I told him that I had set the game to record and was planning to watch it "as live" that evening, so “thanks but no thanks." 

This guy wasn't one who'd take “no"  for an answer. So, sure enough, one hour into the game, he called with a game update. I told him again, much more forcefully, that I wasn't interested in receiving his updates. But, he went on, undeterred. 

I stopped answering my desk phone as I saw his frequent calls coming in throughout the afternoon. But, of course, the voicemails played spoiler and my Opening Day plans were dashed.

Thus, a new tradition was born. 

And every year since then, I have taken Opening Day as a day off. It is one of my favorite holidays of the year.

And to mark this occasion, I am reminded of the quote from former baseball commissioner, the late A. Bartlett Giamatti. If you are a baseball fan, like me, you probably know it by heart. But, if not, it really sums up the game. And in either case, it's the perfect way to close my post for today, Braves Opening Day.

“It breaks your heart. It is designed to break your heart. The game begins in the spring, when everything else begins again, and it blossoms in the summer, filling the afternoons and evenings, and then as soon as the chill rains come, it stops and leaves you to face the fall alone. You count on it, rely on it to buffer the passage of time, to keep the memory of sunshine and high skies alive, and then just when the days are all twilight, when you need it most, it stops." 

― A. Bartlett Giamatti