Hello and welcome to the Atlanta Braves Lineup, Opening Day (Night) 2026 Edition.
For your perusal this fine March evening, we have entrees such as “Jonah Heim is on this team?” and “Eli White hitting sixth.” To be fair, the Braves are making the best of their situation, but both Heim and White will likely bedevil the future version of you that tries to do the whatever-the-2036-Sporcle-equivalent is and gets stumped by the missing spots in the 2026 Opening Day lineup you try to re-encounter in your mind palace.
In any case, this lineup is largely as expected, just… kind of jarring. Ozzie Albies is hitting third because Kansas City starter Cole Ragans throws baseballs with his left hand. Among players available to the team, Steamer’s split-specific, versus-southpaws projection is the fourth-best, so hitting him third makes sense. Given the uncertainty about whether Albies is firmly in the twilight of his career or not, there’s at least a chance this makes sense.
Both of these lineups are somewhat similar in that they are basically halved into “pretty scary” and “not so scary.” The Braves’ trio of White, Mauricio Dubon, and Jonah Heim — whether pressed into service due to injury or not — is more defensively-focused than anything else; if Michael Harris II has another struggle-laden year, that trio could be a quartet. The same goes for the 6-7-8 spots in the Kansas City lineup, including acquisitions Starling Marte and Isaac Collins. Carter Jensen absolutely destroyed the ball in 69 PAs last year and may not be hitting ninth for long. (Amusingly, both teams have two catchers in the lineup.)
If we’re talking head-to-head history, well, there’s not much. Six Braves in this lineup have a combined 20 PAs against Ragans, and 12 of those come from Dubon (who actually has a .376 xwOBA / .382 wOBA in those 12 PAs, though he hasn’t faced Ragans since 2024).
There are also six Royals that have faced Chris Sale, and again, it’s overwhelmingly tilted towards one guy: Salvador Perez has faced Sale in 69 distinct PAs, and has an uremarkable .236 xwOBA / .273 wOBA. The other guys all have fewer than ten (or zero) PAs against Sale so far.
With this being Opening Day and all, both starters probably aren’t going to stick around too long. Expect to see Mike Yastrzemski come in when the Royals move to a righty reliever; the Royals will probably throw Jac Caglianone (and maybe Kyle Isbel for Lane Thomas?) in there when the Braves do the same.
