Game 1 lineups: Nats vs. Yankees

And so it begins. The strangest season in baseball history gets underway with the strangest opening night in baseball history. The defending champion Nationals will raise a flag and a pennant and face the sport's most-storied franchise, even though it comes from the American League. It will be televised nationally, with artificial crowd noise pumped through the otherwise empty stadium's public address system.

And the Nationals' star slugger won't be in the lineup after he tested positive for COVID-19.

Such is the unusual nature of the 2020 Major League Baseball season, which commences tonight without Juan Soto. Andrew Stevenson will get an unexpected start in left field, a daunting assignment for the 26-year-old.

So what can we expect from Max Scherzer and Gerrit Cole in their rematch of Game 1 (but not Game 5 or Game 7) of last year's World Series? Both aces threw a lot during the hiatus and believe they're good to go six innings or 100 pitches tonight. Whether that will actually hold true once they're throwing with full effort in a competitive situation for the first time since October remains to be seen.

It promises to be an eventful and unprecedented evening on South Capitol Street. Hope everyone enjoys the game safely at home.

NEW YORK YANKEES at WASHINGTON NATIONALS
Where: Nationals Park
Gametime: 7:08 p.m. EDT
TV: ESPN, MLB.tv
Radio: 106.7 FM, MLB.com
Weather: Chance of storms, 83 degrees, wind 8 mph out to right field

NATIONALS
SS Trea Turner
RF Adam Eaton
2B Starlin Castro
DH Howie Kendrick
1B Eric Thames
C Kurt Suzuki
3B Asdrúbal Cabrera
LF Andrew Stevenson
CF Victor Robles

RHP Max Scherzer

YANKEES
CF Aaron Hicks
RF Aaron Judge
SS Gleyber Torres
DH Giancarlo Stanton
LF Brett Gardner
C Gary Sánchez
1B Luke Voit
3B Gio Urshela
2B Tyler Wade

RHP Gerrit Cole