Happy Opening Day! Cubs-Dodgers Tokyo Series Lineups, Roster Stuff, Matt Shaw, Keegan Thompson, Brad Keller and More

WAKE UP! It's a beautiful day for a ball game, from Tokyo. The Cubs and Dodgers have set their rosters for this delightfully bizarre, meaningful-yet-preposterous two-game series, kicking off the 2025 season. A few interesting tidbits await.

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It's hard to surprise anyone with decisions about the roster for a series an ocean away from home. The guys you wanted got on the plane, more or less. The guys you didn't want stayed home, more or less. So, yes, Matt Shaw is officially active for the Tokyo Series, which begins at 5:10 AM Central, when Shota Imanaga takes his place on the mound for the (technically) homestanding Cubs against the Dodgers. In fact, Shaw is in the starting lineup for his big-league debut, batting fifth:

CUBS LINEUP

Ian Happ - LF
Seiya Suzuki - DH
Kyle Tucker - RF
Michael Busch - 1B
Matt Shaw - 3B
Dansby Swanson - SS
Pete Crow-Armstrong - CF
Miguel Amaya - C
Jon Berti - 2B

Miguel Amaya draws the start behind the plate for the season opener, working with Imanaga, and Michael Busch gets the nod at first base—despite the extreme reverse splits of Dodgers starter Yoshinobu Yamamoto. Jon Berti is playing instead of Gage Workman, though—not that anyone particularly expected that Workman would get a start at second right away. It also feels like Craig Counsell has placed Kyle Tucker and Busch conspicuously side-by-side, inviting (tempting?) Dave Roberts to make an aggressive move to a lefty in the middle innings—one Counsell might counter by pinch-hitting Turner for Busch.

To make room for Shaw on the 40-man roster, Keegan Thompson was designated for assignment. He still seems to have enough cachet around the game that he's likely to be traded to some team eager to roll the dice, rather than clearing or even reaching waivers, but the Cubs will only get a small amount of financial relief in any deal. Thompson was simply crowded out of the bullpen picture, and is out of minor-league options.

Speaking of the pitching staff, in addition to Imanaga, the Cubs will carry the following hurlers for this short series:

That list just goes on forever, doesn't it? The Dodgers (how bold!) are only rostering 12 pitchers to survive this two-game series, but the Cubs went ahead and carried all 13 they're allowed. That makes for a truly wild-looking list, because it doesn't include veteran starters Jameson Taillon or Matthew Boyd, who pitched multiple innings in the exhibition games leading into this set. That leaves so many hurlers available that the team can't possibly complain about the taxing effect of having to fill important innings so early in the schedule, which is surely why the league has structured the roster rules for these series this way.

In the same vein, bringing Brad Keller along and leaving him on the inactive list as part of the traveling party seems to be the team's way of kicking the can down the road when it comes to whether or not he'll be added to their 40-man roster and carried come Opening Day. He has an opt-out in his minor-league deal, so they can't hold onto him much longer without activating him, but since he's not yet on the 40-man and they already needed to create a spot for Shaw, the team has elected to wait and make a final decision on him closer to Mar. 27, when they'll play in Arizona to kick off the season in earnest.

Keller is still all but assured of a spot; this is just procedural. With all those pitchers available, it wouldn't have made much sense to force another transaction right now. The Cubs have been fortunate to come this far in such an unusual camp with very few injuries. That could change any minute, though, so they're trying to keep their powder dry.

The Dodgers will line up thusly against Imanaga.

DODGERS LINEUP

This is certainly not the most imposing iteration of the Dodgers lineup the league will see this year. That Imanaga (and Steele, for that matter) is left-handed helps a bit, by inviting Roberts to use Kiké Hernández instead of Michael Conforto, but some of that is balanced by the fact that Tommy Edman hits considerably better right-handed. The real glaring omission here is Mookie Betts, who will be sidelined for this series after an illness that resulted in him losing over 10 pounds in the last week. That's a break for the Cubs.

The stage is set; the chorus is intoning its overture. These games count, but they're also about the pageantry and the novelty. They belong to themselves, as much as to the rest of the coming season. Enjoy them, and savor the moment when the weight of a new season, solid and real, lands on your shoulder. It's Opening Day, even if (here in the States) the day really hasn't opened yet, and the opening is as much of ourselves to the season as of the season to us.