Chicago Cubs Lineup (3/26/26): Busch Leads Off, Mo Baller DH, Shaw RF, Boyd on Bump
Chicago Cubs baseball is on the air! After what felt like an interminable spring training, the Cubs are playing a meaningful baseball game for the first time in over five months. Of course, that also means the overreactions will be turned back up, mostly in the negative direction. But for at least a little while, we can all feel good about the start of the regular season.
First baseman Michael Busch resumes his role as the leadoff batter against righties, followed by Alex Bregman at third base and Ian Happ in left. Pete Crow-Armstrong plays center and bats cleanup, then it’s Nico Hoerner at second, Carson Kelly catching, and Moises Ballesteros behind the plate. Dansby Swanson is at short and Matt Shaw bats ninth in right.
Matthew Boyd takes the bump for his first Opening Day start since getting the nod in 2020 and ’21 with Detroit, and he’ll be riding a little emotion as he thinks about how proud his late grandfather would have been. Boyd had a very rough finish to the spring, allowing eight earned runs with three homers over 4.2 innings a little less than a week ago, so let’s hope he got that all out of his system. It helps that the Nats aren’t even trying to compete this season.
Don’t tell that to Cade Cavalli, who gets the Opening Day start in what figures to be his first full MLB season. He debuted with one start in 2023, then missed all of ’24 due to elbow reconstruction before working his way back to the bigs last year. The former No. 22 overall pick out of Oklahoma is now looking to establish himself as a legit top-of-the-rotation arm for a club that has been actively rebuilding for a while now.
Cavalli’s right arm looked as fresh as ever last season as he ran his four-seam to the plate at 97 mph. He throws from a relatively high slot and cuts the heater, which makes up about 30% of his pitches. It will battle his knuckle curve for supremacy in that regard, and the two work well off one another because the breaking ball gets tremendous depth with a little less glove-side movement than usual.
That might be giving too much credit to pitches that didn’t get much value last season, so perhaps we should look at the 90 mph changeup that saw strong results from big-time arm-side run. The offspeed closely matches Cavalli’s sinker in terms of movement profile, making that velo difference very effective. He also has a 94 mph cutter that was sprayed around a little too much last year.
Despite getting chase at a 95th-percentile clip, Cavalli’s 18.3% strikeout rate was in the 18th percentile. His 4.4% barrel rate was also in the 95th percentile, and his 55.1% grounder rate was in the 93rd. If he can keep that up while figuring out how to put guys away, he’ll be very dangerous. I see him as a huge breakout candidate this season, but I’m hoping that starts next week.
This one could be a bit of an adventure with the wind coming out of left field at around 12 mph and gusting at nearly 30 mph. There’s also rain in the forecast early, with thunderstorms rolling through Chicago in the late afternoon. Fingers crossed.
First pitch is at 1:20pm CT on Marquee and 104.3 FM The Score
#OPENINGDAY EVERYONE!!!
Watch the game live on @WatchMarquee pic.twitter.com/G0oBwa0Qim
— Chicago Cubs (@Cubs) March 26, 2026
