Vitamin SEA: Opening Day Jitters

The 2026 season is underway! Let's all calm down a little

Baseball is back! The Mariners already have lost a game that they should have won. It’s like they never left.

After a long offseason and a WBC where no Mariners did much of anything, the season is finally here. Every Opening Day there will be people lining up on Twitter to overreact to what the team looks like on the first game of the season. Let’s have a quick group therapy session to talk out our feelings and go through all the knee-jerk reactions you might be having right now.

Is Brendan Donovan the best free agent signing ever?: Known power hitter Brendan Donovan going deep in his first AB in a Mariners uniform was pretty amazing, and the writing was on the wall for his fast start. He hit .413 in Spring Training and looked comfortable doing it. He’s going to be a real treat this season.

Is Julio going to have ANOTHER slow start?: Plenty of people went hitless last night, not just Julio. “God’s gift to Spring Training” Cole Young notched a handful of strikeouts too, Cal and Naylor both struggled, give Julio a few games at least before we chalk it up to the same old, same old.

Is the bullpen going to be ok?: Yes. We didn’t see Brash or Munoz (even though we should’ve). We can’t worry about the bullpen after seeing multiple innings of Legumina.

Is Dan Wilson messing things up already?: I mean I can’t say that I’m thrilled that we had the bullpen management that we did, but this is what we’re used to. Dan Wilson makes odd bullpen decisions all the time, it’s not something new to freak out about, we knew this stuff happens.

Is Dom Canzone the second coming of Barry Bonds?: Yes. Hide your spouse, hide your children, stay inside because baseballs will be raining from the sky like a Biblical plague. We are all living in the Can-Zone. He is the one true baseball player, and will lead us to the promised land (if we can get more guys on base).

Opening Day is always a time to predict the whole season based on one game. Half the fanbases scream “We’re gonna win it all!” and the other half scream “The season is over already!”. I hope we can all at least wait a week before calling our shot. In all fairness, I didn’t love what I saw from the top of our lineup besides Donovan, and I would’ve preferred some cleaner innings from the bullpen. But Logan looked great out there besides one bad inning, and the marine layer is clearly not stopping the Mariners from hitting home runs. When Luke Raley and Dom Canzone are putting the bulk of the offense on their back, you have to feel decent about the depth of the lineup. I predicted the Mariners to repeat as division winners, and one loss isn’t shaking that. George Kirby is on the bump tonight, I’ll be at the game tomorrow for Cal bobblehead night, life is good. Welcome back, baseball.

Go M’s,

Henry “I’m gonna miss Rick Rizz a lot and I haven’t processed it yet” Neiman