Chicago Cubs fans will love this 2025 Opening Day lineup projection

The Chicago Cubs Opening Day roster is becoming clearer by the day, as the team is making decisions sooner than all other teams, aside from their opponent in Toyko, the Los Angeles Dodgers.  Recently the big league roster was trimmed down to 42 players, in which 31 will end up flying overseas (26-man active roster and five man taxi squad).

One key player whose fate has not yet been decided is third baseman Matt Shaw.  The talented prospect started playing in games a bit later than expected due to an oblique issue, but is now out there competing.  Recently, The Athletic provided an Opening Day roster projection that fans will love, as it includes Shaw in the lineup.

Chicago Cubs fans will love this 2025 Opening Day roster projection

Beat reporter Patrick Mooney recently gave his thoughts as to what the Cubs Opening Day roster could look like.  We are going to focus on the offensive lineup.  Here is how he had Chicago lined up to face Yoshinobu Yamamoto on March 18.  

The lineup

1. Ian Happ, LF
2. Kyle Tucker, RF
3. Seiya Suzuki, DH
4. Michael Busch, 1B
5. Matt Shaw, 3B
6. Dansby Swanson, SS
7. Pete Crow-Armstrong, CF
8. Miguel Amaya, C
9. Jon Berti, 2B

As expected, Mooney left second baseman Nico Hoerner out of the lineup, as he is not expected to be ready until the end of March.  Justin Turner was left out of the lineup as this projection has Shaw manning third base, but Turner would be available as a pinch hitter.

One adjustment that could be made to the lineup

Taking a look at Mooney’s lineup construction, he did a great job mixing and matching righties and lefties.  Happ, a switch hitter, is leading off, followed by lefty Kyle Tucker, righty Seiya Suzuki, and then lefty Michael Busch in the clean up spot.  After that the only lefty in the bottom half of the order is Pete Crow-Armstrong, who is sandwiched in between pairs of righties.

One adjustment that could be made to this lineup is flip-flopping Shaw and Swanson.  As talented as Shaw is, having a veteran like Swanson following the cleanup spot would make the Dodgers more inclined to pitch to Busch rather than pitching around him to face Shaw, potentially forcing the unproven talent into a higher-pressure situation.

It will be interesting to see who the Cubs end up going with against the Dodgers in Toyko.  Chicago heads overseas on Tuesday, March 11, so who is all traveling will become apparent real soon.