The first Orioles lineup of the year doesn’t mean a whole lot headed forward, if recent history is any indication. The Orioles, for a variety of different reasons, used 125 different batting orders to get through the 2016 season. For this year, we can already be fairly sure that, with a lefty pitching for Toronto in the second game, there will be at least two changes from the first game’s lineup to the second one.
But there’s still something special about the Opening Day lineup, isn’t there? It’s got meaning because it’s one of the last signs, short of the first pitch of the game actually being thrown, that Orioles baseball is back.