Baseball

Opening Day came early to Wrigley Field on Sunday night, with the Chicago Cubs losing to the St. Louis Cardinals, 3-0, at the only stadium in professional baseball that could’ve really used an extra 24 hours of preparation.

The Kansas City Royals locked up one of their most promising young arms Saturday. According to ESPN.com's Jerry Crasnick (via SportsCenter), Yordano Ventura agreed to a five-year, $23 million extension with the team. Jon Heyman of CBS Sports provided more detail:

Entering the 2015 season, the Arizona Diamondbacks are expected to be in a rebuilding mode but with a bright future.

Young players are dominating the D-backs rotation and starting lineup thus far in spring training. Chase Anderson (27), Rubby De La Rosa (26), Jeremy Hellickson (27) and Archie Bradley (22) are all confirmed as part of the rotation.

Imagine arguably the best prospect in MLB, who has belted more home runs than any other player in spring training, starting the 2015 season in the minors.

Doesn't make sense, right?

Kris Bryant has been sensational for the Chicago Cubs. The 23-year-old finished spring training with a .425 batting average, nine home runs and 15 RBI.

While the weather certainly doesn't feel like it, the Cubs are set to open their season against the Cardinals on Sunday night in the first MLB game of the year. With the new season getting underway, a new era of Cubs baseball will be ushered in.

For a while there, it was possible that Josh Hamilton would not be seen on a Major League Baseball diamond in 2015.

Now we know he'll be playing ball as soon as he can, and that has ramifications for the Los Angeles Angels and, eventually, for MLB and the MLB Players Association.

Los Angeles Angels outfielder Josh Hamilton will not be suspended for his substance abuse missteps in the offseason, according to a statement from Major League Baseball:

Ken Rosenthal of Fox Sports reported the Angels' statement on MLB's decision:

The Detroit Tigers begin the 2015 MLB season in less than one week.

The Cincinnati Reds are getting no love.

In the most recent season outlook, Grantland writer Ben Lindbergh's NLC Preview uses a lot of data and makes mathematical projections, and not even the numbers are improving this team's outlook. In case you haven't got around to it, here's an excerpt on why we can expect the Reds to suck in 2015:

The San Francisco Giants embark on the 2015 campaign with one goal in mind: They want to defend their World Series title and win it again.

The baseball season is a long, arduous process, which makes the Giants' three world championships in the past five years a tremendous accomplishment.