After a remarkable 2025 season, Trevor Rogers will take the ball for the Orioles on Opening Day.
Thirteen days before Baltimore hosts Minnesota to begin the 2026 campaign at Oriole Park at Camden Yards, the club announced the left-hander would start the March 26 opener. Voted Most Valuable Oriole by the local media as one of the few bright spots in a very disappointing season for a last-place club, Rogers entered spring training widely regarded as one of two main candidates — the other being right-hander Kyle Bradish — to be the Opening Day starter for new manager Craig Albernaz.
“It’s an honor for me to take the ball for Game 1 and show up for the fans at Camden Yards,” Rogers said in a statement released by the team. “I’m fired up and ready to go.”
In 18 starts covering 109 2/3 innings last season, Rogers went 9-3 with a sparkling 1.81 ERA. Among major league pitchers logging at least 100 innings, he ranked second in ERA, first in opponent batting average (.179), and third in WHIP (0.90). Those elite results resulted in Rogers finishing ninth in AL Cy Young Award voting despite making only six starts before the All-Star break.
Of course, the 28-year-old wasn’t regarded nearly as well at this time a year ago after he had flopped arriving from Miami at the 2024 trade deadline — which resulted in a demotion to the minors — and then injured his knee before the start of spring training. However, Rogers had a superb 2025 season debut in the nightcap of a doubleheader at Fenway Park on May 24 and then returned to the majors for good by mid-June. His second-half efforts earned him AL Pitcher of the Month honors in August, and he became the first pitcher to be voted Most Valuable Oriole since Rodrigo Lopez in 2002.
While we now know Rogers will be starting against the Twins in the first game of the season, how the rest of the pitching staff will be structured remains to be seen. The season-opening status of veteran right-hander Zach Eflin — who started the opener in Toronto last year — is unclear as he returns from having back surgery last August, but the 31-year-old made his Grapefruit League debut last week and has deemed himself ready to go.
Should Eflin make the Opening Day roster and not be slow-played on the 10-day injured list, the Orioles could choose to begin the season with a six-man rotation that would also include Rogers, Bradish, Shane Baz, Chris Bassitt, and Dean Kremer. However, that would mean carrying just seven relievers in the bullpen with the active roster being capped at 13 pitchers. Of course, the makeup of the bullpen isn’t settled either with right-handed setup man Andrew Kittredge unlikely to be ready for Opening Day as he deals with shoulder inflammation.
