Every baseball game counts the same, obviously, but for certain teams, teams who may be at particularly pivotal points in their franchise’s, let’s say, competitive window, the beginning of the season is of particular importance. The next month, April, can set the tone: Win big, and the rest of the season is all set up for you; lose big, and big questions will loom … questions that could extend all the way up to the Trade Deadline.
Are you competing over the long haul? Will you build on a great month? Or will a difficult opening month put you so far behind that you can’t catch up … and you start looking to unload talent rather than add it? It is obviously early in the season. But the thing about a baseball season, particularly when your franchise is at a fork-in-the-road decision point, is that it can get late early.
Here are six teams who could build off of big Aprils … or could just as easily see it all fall apart.
Astros
Record entering April: 4-2
The Astros have been on such a great run for the past decade that the only season during that stretch in which they had a losing record, they still made the ALCS. (Though that was the pandemic-shortened 2020 season.)
But there is no question that there has been an erosion from their peak. They missed the playoffs last year for the first time since 2016, and they’ve won fewer games each year since winning the World Series in 2022. Though you don’t need to look at the standings to see how different it is these days: You just need to look out on the field and see there is no Alex Bregman, George Springer, Framber Valdez, Justin Verlander or Kyle Tucker. Jose Altuve and Yordan Alvarez are holding down the fort, but the roster looks increasingly thin around them, and with the farm system emptied out to the point that it ranks No. 29 in MLB Pipeline's team rankings, you wonder how much better it’s going to get in Houston.
If they struggle in April -- and potentially fall too far behind the now-the-class-of-the-division Mariners -- you wonder if this older, fading team starts to look toward the future … and starts moving on from its past.
Braves
Record entering April: 3-2
Can you imagine how Braves fans would feel about this era of Braves baseball if they hadn’t gone on that incredible run in October 2021?
The Braves were lauded, correctly so, for locking in players such as Ronald Acuña Jr., Ozzie Albies, Matt Olson, Michael Harris II, Sean Murphy and Spencer Strider to long-term contracts, assuring that they would all grow up and grow old together with the Braves, but it hasn’t turned out the way it was supposed to. Some players have gotten hurt, some have seen their development stall and some have actively gotten worse. Suddenly, that young core isn’t so young anymore. As the Mets and Phillies continue to muscle up in the NL East, the Braves are starting to look like their time may have passed.
We’ve been waiting for their buzzard’s luck over the last few years to turn, but that doesn’t mean it actually is going to turn. A rough April will have Braves fans, and maybe the team itself, wondering if 2021 wasn’t the start of something … but instead its end.
Giants
Record entering April: 2-3
This one is pretty self-explanatory: When you make as unconventional of a managerial hire as the Giants did this offseason, everyone is going to be watching very closely to see how it turns out. Tony Vitello is going to face many challenges as a manager, like every manager does, but because this is his first go-round and he has no history with the Majors, a slow start for the Giants will seem like a reflection on him.
That might not necessarily be fair -- the most significant addition the Giants made to a team that finished .500 last year was Vitello -- but that sort of scrutiny was inevitable. He won 72% of his games as coach of the Tennessee Volunteers; he’s going to win a lot fewer as manager of the San Francisco Giants. But how many does he have to win to earn acceptance? And how loud do the whispers get if April goes awry?
Orioles
Record entering April: 2-3
Orioles fans might argue that the urgency the franchise showed this offseason was overdue, but there certainly was urgency shown. Pete Alonso, Taylor Ward, Ryan Helsley and Shane Baz are all here now, with a new manager with a clear mandate: The rebuild is over, it’s time to win now. That’s no easy task in the AL East, of course, with the Yankees, Red Sox and Blue Jays all looking not just formidable, but as urgent as the Orioles.
The Orioles have only three games against those three teams all month, just a home series against the Red Sox from April 24-26, and they start May with a four-game set at Yankee Stadium. If the Orioles are wobbly at that point -- if they are anything close to the 9-16 they were last April -- the vultures are going to be circling.
Padres
Record entering April: 1-4
Has the Padres' moment passed? Their farm system is actually worse than the Astros’, they’re getting dangerously older (by the end of April, Fernando Tatis Jr. and Jackson Merrill will be the only lineup regulars under 30) and they’re further away from the Dodgers (their rival they leveled up to challenge in the first place) than they were when they started all this.
They have so much money committed through the next five years that blowing anything up will be difficult, but eventually, they’re going to rebuild that farm system and, assuredly, at some point they will probably have to start over. A difficult April would make all these pending issues feel a lot less pending.
Reds
Record entering April: 3-2
The Reds made the playoffs last year. Remember? It’s reasonable if you forgot: They weren’t in the playoffs very long. There was initially some hope that the Reds could build off of that postseason appearance thanks to an underrated rotation, but that rotation took a massive hit with the news that Hunter Greene will miss at least half the season with an elbow injury, a devastating blow from which you wonder if the Reds are going to be able to recover.
The signing of Eugenio Suárez was a positive homecoming story, but it’s still just a one-year contract (with a mutual option for 2027), and if the Reds aren’t able to keep their head above water for the first half, he could very well end up being moved at the Trade Deadline again. The loss of Greene hurt the Reds so much that it put the whole season in jeopardy: A slow April and/or May could make the Reds wonder if the smart play is to regroup and plan for 2027 … and, potentially, beyond.