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The Yankees began their 2025 campaign with a 4-2 win over the Milwaukee Brewers on Thursday in The Bronx. Here are some notes from Opening Day including details on Carlos Rodon's start, Anthony Volpe and more...

Anthony Volpe's improved timing

The Yankees' offense has question marks after Juan Soto signed with the Mets in the offseason. Will they score enough runs, especially with all the injuries to the starting rotation?

Thursday, Austin Wells and Volpe helped answer that question -- at least for one game -- as their solo homers powered the offense. Volpe's home run was impressive in that he turned on a 95.4 mph fastball from Freddy Peralta and went opposite field, depositing it 373 feet into right-center field. The blast gave the Yanks a 2-0 lead, and although it was Volpe's only hit -- he finished 1-for-4 with one strikeout -- Aaron Judge is seeing a difference in the young shortstop's approach at the plate.

"His timing. That’s been the biggest thing I’ve noticed since being called up in 2023," Judge explained. "He just has better timing, looks comfortable in the box. When you’re aggressive in the box that’s when you start to take those tough pitches. It just starts by having that mindset of going up there, being confident and taking your swings."

The Yankees will need Volpe, Wells and other youngsters like Jazz Chisholm and Jasson Dominguez to do a bit more this season if the team hopes to make it back to the World Series.

But the Yankees captain is confident the kids will get it done. 

"I'm excited about our young guys and what they’re going to do," he said. "Wells, Volpe, Jazz, Dominguez all those guys are going to be a big part of our success this year and it’s cool to see those guys get off to a good start."

Austin Wells' confidence behind the plate

Wells was always scouted as a bat-first catcher, but last year and this spring has shown he can be a very good defensive catcher and pitch-caller with the rotation.

"To see where he’s at now is to see one of the game’s really good defensive coaches," manager Aaron Boone said. "Ultimately, his ability and his commitment, and the one thing I always noticed, there’s just presence to him. I felt that way about him the first big league camp with us. There’s something about him you notice."

Thursday's starter Carlos Rodon echoed his manager's sentiments about the young backstop. 

"His presence behind the plate, he brings a lot of confidence in who he is," Rodon said. "This is a guy who does his homework this is a guy who spends his time at the ballpark preparing for the game ahead. He’s grown tremendously defensively, as we know. I know it’s one game, but he has a good bat as well."

Wells led off Thursday's game, becoming the first Yankees catcher to do so. He also hit a leadoff homer, making more Yankees history and finishing 1-for-3 with a walk.

Carlos Rodon's pitch mix

Rodon has always been known as a two-pitch pitcher. His "break and butter," as Boone calls it, are his fastball and slider. Well, the southpaw used six different pitches in his Opening Day start and it seemingly worked against a good Brewers team.

The left-hander allowed just one run over 5.1 innings while striking out seven. It was a solid start for a rotation that needs him to be that No. 2 guy behind newly-acquired southpaw Max Fried and with Luis Gil and Gerrit Cole out for long periods of time -- in the case of Cole, the whole season.

Despite that, Boone doesn't think Rodon needs to "step up" when asked about it after the game.

"He was incredibly consistent for us last year. He’s capable of it if not more so," he explained. "I just want him to really focus on his job every single day. Not just the day he pitches, now starts the process of when he gets back out there in six days. If he does that, the results will handle themselves. He has ability. That’s always my message to Carlos, just focus on chopping wood everyday."

So whose idea was for Rodon to throw six pitches? Well, Wells of course.

“Wells was great with the pitch. We get a plan together and I just roll," Rodon said. "There’s not much decision-making on my part. We get into a rhythm, he calls the pitch and I throw. We featured a lot of today and I thought he was great behind the plate." 

"[Rodon's] slider was really good today too. That’s still going to be his calling card, but I think the changeup is really good now," Boone said. "The ability to slow it down with the curveball and then introducing that sinker… He’s capable of doing that and to have real longevity in this game as a pitcher is to be able to evolve and adapt and add and subtract from your arsenal."

Rodon was asked if incorporating these new pitches makes him less predictable, and the 32-year-old said it does.

"The scouting report on me the last few years jas been four-seam’s up in the zone, slider’s below," he said. "The plan as a hitter was to cover the fastball and react to sliders.  The rounding of the repertoire and adding a few other pitches that move different and the change of speeds, it makes it less predictable especially the usage portion of it."

HOUSTON -- Juan Soto was clearly angry, and you love to see it. What artist is ever happy with what they make? This is the curse of greatness.

The Mets clubhouse after their 3-1 Opening Day loss to the Astros was appropriately calm, fine, confident, whatever. It’s just one game. But then there was Soto, agonizing over his at-bat against Josh Hader.

“He got me,” a downcast Soto said of the game-ending strikeout that stranded the tying runs on base. “A pretty good pitch, a slider down and away that I wasn’t expecting.”

And what was he expecting?

“His best pitch,” Soto said. “His best pitch is the fastball, so I was thinking the fastball.”

Soto rarely guesses wrong, but it happened this time. His meek wave at Hader’s slider was an aberration, and one that left him brooding.

Immediately after the obligatory discussion with reporters, Soto left the clubhouse. He did not stop to smile, schmooze, chit chat or join his teammates in the food room. The rest of the Mets had perspective: It was a noble comeback, it fell short, what are you gonna do, let’s eat.

Soto was just like, dammit. I’m going home. He’s probably still thinking about it.

HOLMES WAS ALSO REFLECTIVE

In spring training, Clay Holmes threw his vaunted sinker 34 percent of the time. The former All-Star reliever was a starting pitcher now, and featured a wide array of pitches: four-seam fastball, sweeper, slider, cutter, changeup.

But when the bell rang for the regular season, 49 percent of Holmes’ pitches were sinkers. He threw the changeup -- the big new pitch that wowed Mets officials in February and March -- just four times. This was partly because the Astros are a righty-heavy offense, and Holmes’ changeup works best against lefties, but it was also because Holmes reverted to his comfort zone.

Spring training is not big league game speed. Spring training is when you throw whatever whenever, and try to sharpen the pitches. The regular season is when you have to sequence those pitches in a way that deceives and defeats batters. This is new for Holmes.

“Maybe the second time through [the lineup] there was room for the changeups more, but that’s something we’ll feel out more and learn as we go,” Holmes said.

Imagine yourself in this situation: Sinkers made you a star. Sinkers are your path toward success. You’re in the intensity of the moment, and what are you going to do? Probably what you’ve always done.

Another question that followed Holmes into his transition to the starting rotation was his ability to hold his command for multiple innings. This requires mental and physical endurance beyond what a reliever needs to find.

A veteran scout watching from the stands said that Holmes’ “delivery opened up front side a little more [mid-game, meaning that his] legs probably got tired.”

Holmes said that he lost his command, and probably some stamina, in the second and third innings -- but regained them in the fourth. This is a positive indicator. Now he knows that he can lose it and get it back in the same game, a luxury that closers do not have.

The Dodgers marched in from center field on a blue carpet. The Commissioner’s Trophy cruised in from the parking lot in an icy blue convertible.

The championship flag was raised by the owners. The championship sign was unveiled by two fire department officials.

The pregame festivities before the Dodgers’ home opener at Chavez Ravine was nicely rolling along Thursday when suddenly, appropriately, in its final moments, sweet became spectacular.

The ceremony finished with a homer from the guys who hit the homers.

Gibby actually met Freddie.

Moments after Freddie Freeman and his family were honored for his Game 1 game-winning grand slam in last year’s World Series, out of the Dodger dugout popped Kirk Gibson, the Game 1 homer-hitting hero of 1988.

Read more:Shohei Ohtani hits one of Dodgers' three homers to beat Tigers in their home opener

Gibson walked to the mound. Freeman walked behind home plate. Gibson tossed him a pitch. They hugged. The crowd roared in surprise and appreciation. Goose bumps everywhere.

As the Dodgers’ mascot and trophy chauffeur Ice Cube once famously said, “Today was a good day.”

For those wondering what the defending champions can possibly do for an encore, they began to answer that question Thursday on a perfectly choreographed return to town in front of a sellout crowd that screamed like it was still guzzling last October’s champagne.

On the field, their shirts and caps adorned in gold lettering honoring their championship, the Dodgers remained untarnished with a comeback 5-4 win over the Detroit Tigers. Just like so many times last season, big hits powered the victory. And just like so many times, they came from Teoscar Hernández and Shohei Ohtani, who homered in the fifth and seventh innings, respectively, to help the Dodgers beat defending AL Cy Young Award winner Tarik Skubal.

Three games, three wins, and you have to ask … 162-0 anyone?

Off the field, the organization classily honored their present with a bow to their past, bringing Gibson back for a rare appearance that reminded their enduring fan base why they keep coming back opener after opener.

“I thought the ceremony was fantastic... we nailed it,” Dodgers manager Dave Roberts said.

It was particularly special for fans such as 92-year-old Phil Brooks, the retired physician attending his 60th consecutive home opener, more than half a century experiencing rebirth from the field level.

Brooks was wearing a faded 20-year-old Dodger jacket, but his passion was undimmed.

“I just love the home opener,” he said. “It’s a renewal, when all hopes are possible.”

Like many Dodger fans, this is a tradition Brooks has passed on to his family, as he was accompanied Thursday for the 40th consecutive opener by his son, Stan. During the rest of the season Stan brings his three sons to the games, prepping them for the time when they will take their destined spot in the home opener seats.

“I’ve loved sharing this day,” Phil said. “Every year is the beginning of new hopes and dreams.”

Dodger Stadium was filled with both for a team that had already swept its first two games against the Chicago Cubs in Tokyo. While those first two games counted in the standings, they really didn’t count in the soul, which was newly refreshed in a home opener that featured stars familiar and new.

Read more:Shaikin: Apple's documentary on Dodgers provides 'all-access' look at World Series run

Tommy Edman, the hero of last fall’s National League Championship Series, blasted a second-inning homer.

Hernández, who the Dodgers smartly retained as a free agent this winter, hit a three-run homer in the fifth inning after an Andy Pages single and a Mookie Betts walk.

Ohtani, whose bat understands big moments better than any in baseball, clinched the win with a solo blast in the seventh.

“It was amazing,” Hernández said. “It was a great feeling to be back at Dodger Stadium.”

Then there were the new kids, starting with Blake Snell, the two-time Cy Young winning starter who signed a five-year $182-million contract in the offseason. He was frustrating but efficient, walking four and loading the bases twice but eventually yielding two runs in five innings for the win. Snell was eventually followed by a shaky one-run inning from new reliever Tanner Scott, who was in the dugout when last season’s World Series-clinching hero Blake Treinen finished it.

“I’ve got a lot to learn... a lot to improve on,” Snell said.

No matter who was starring, every good Dodger play was greeted with a roar that rang of familiarity. This is how Dodger Stadium sounded last year. This is why the Dodgers have such a powerful home-field advantage.

“The fans, just feeling the energy and how much the fans love the team... while I was getting ready I could feel how encouraging they were before the start, how much they showed love to me, that was pretty cool,” Snell said. “Then you go out there and you want to do everything you can to win.”

These fans deserved one more chance to celebrate the title. This opening weekend series, which features a Friday ring ceremony, gives them that chance.

"I'm telling you, I just think that our fan base has waited a long time for this kind of culmination," Roberts said. "It was a huge offseason for the organization, for the club, and then you kind of go to Tokyo and get a chance to be received in Japan like we were. And all the while, our fans here are just watching in anticipation for us to come back here. There's just a lot of excitement and traction, momentum, whatever you want to say, with the Dodger fan base. Our players feel it."

The Dodgers' loud homecoming emphasized not only the Dodger muscle, but the strength of their fans. 

"Huge advantage,” Roberts said. “You can talk to any relief pitcher that faces us in the late innings, seventh, eighth and ninth inning, and they feel the pressure, and they feel it when the game's on the line. So I would say probably the biggest advantage is when we're hitting in the bottom half of the inning in the later innings."

The home opener ended early Thursday evening with the sweetest noise of all.

Welcome back, Randy Newman.

Sign up for more Dodgers news with Dodgers Dugout. Delivered at the start of each series.

This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.

So Clay Holmes made his first start for the Mets on Thursday and he was more meh than masterful against the Houston Astros. His sinker blipped in and out like spotty WiFi and he was generally too wild, all while he was navigating the complexities of a new job. 

Indeed, Holmes’ transition from reliever to starter is still a work in progress, even after a glossy spring camp that had blue-and-orange hopes soaring. Understatement alert: Nothing in the major leagues is easy. Maybe we should’ve expected this, even in the afterglow of his camp. 

Still, there were some moments for Holmes and even those stray glimmers might offer some assurance that Holmes-to-the-rotation, one of the biggest Met pitching moves of the offseason, can work. 

Here’s one of the major pluses for Holmes – the insane sweeper he threw to Jose Altuve in the first inning for strike three. Altuve, a future Hall-of-Famer, flailed wildly at the 82.4 mph pitch, which broke abruptly as if Holmes were steering it with a remote control. It wound up in the left-handed batter's box and Altuve wound up walking back to the Astros bench.

Holmes had set up the finishing pitch with a sinker outside for a called strike and then a swinging strike off a sinker that veered in on Altuve. Altuve, a three-time batting champ, was primed for a big breaker outside and Holmes executed it perfectly. 

In the second inning, with two runners on, he struck out Altuve again, battling back from being down in the count, 3-1, and putting Altuve away with a sinker in. In the third, he caught Yordan Alvarez, one of the game’s most dangerous hitters, looking at a backdoor sweeper that grabbed the outside corner for strike three.

All nifty pitches. Overall, though, Holmes, who was pitching on his 32nd birthday, allowed three runs (two earned) and five hits in just 4.2 innings. He struck out four and walked four – too many – and hit a batter. He threw a career-high 89 pitches (53 strikes). If you think this matters this early, his ERA stands at 3.86. 

All the hits he allowed were singles, though there was some hard contact. Holmes knows he succeeds, as most pitchers, by limiting an opponent’s slugging. Thursday, that advantage was torpedoed by his walks. “Walks that didn’t need to happen,” as he put it to reporters in Houston. 

Maybe, he noted, there were times he was thinking too much. 

And over-relying on an old friend – his sinker. The plunging pitch helped him bloom into one of MLB’s true ground-ball monsters as a reliever. It’s a big reason he was a two-time All-Star relief pitcher for the Yankees. Maybe it was the familiar weapon he counted on too much on a day it wasn’t working. 

Experience should help him streamline his work as a starter. After all, now he has real-time competition data to take into his five-day break in between starts. 

Not that spring training or his relief experience has no application, but now that Holmes has banked his first start since his rookie year (2018) with the Pittsburgh Pirates, he’s got more of a sense of how a starter must attack a lineup and what pitches from his arsenal to use and when. He’ll continue to learn about the intricacies of preparing for a start while sorting through days of waiting for another chance.

The Astros used a righty-heavy lineup against Holmes, which made him think he should perhaps shy away from the kick-change that became such a buzz pitch in camp. He only threw four and only one of those was a strike. But his sinker wasn’t cooking enough to be a weapon against all those righties. In some cases, Holmes said, the sinker was the right pitch to throw in a situation, but they ended up too plump, up high in the strike zone.

Does that fit with his self-evaluation that he, at times, might’ve been thinking too much? Perhaps. Maybe that’s something he can learn from. And he knows, despite his 0.93 ERA in spring, that he’s got plenty to figure out about his new gig. That’s another reason to think he can succeed at this. 

“It’s different than spring training,” Holmes said of his first real start in years. “It’s definitely a learning process.”