For all the excitement of MLB Opening Day, there's often a feeling of hesitation for baseball fans as their team's seasons get underway. The first few games can feel like a trial run as teams feel each other out and star players struggle through their first couple outings. Sure, the games count now, but is there even much to learn from these first few clumsy contests?

The beauty of MLB Opening Weekend, though, is that slowly but surely, we get moments that remind us of the long, winding journey the season is about to take us on, from huge celebrations, to heated altercations, to wacky and hilarious antics. So even though the season is just 2% complete, we can all start to feel like we're in midseason form once again. Here, then, were the top five moments of the weekend that proved Major League Baseball is all the way back.

Bryce Harper's death-defying leap of faith

Bryce Harper has been steadily endearing himself to Phillies fans throughout his first half-decade in the City of Brotherly Love thanks to his appreciation for the city's sports culture and his all-out effort. This is a superstar player coming off two injury-affected seasons, playing a brand-new position he was forced to learn as he healed from Tommy John surgery. And he didn't hesitate to launch his entire body head-over-heels, straight over a guardrail and onto the concrete.

In a way, it's even better that Harper didn't catch the ball. That would have made it seem like it was all too obvious that he should have been eager to dive into the abyss of the camera well. But Harper really didn't need to do that, especially now that we have the benefit of hindsight. It's just who he is, and no matter which game of the season it might be, it's never too early for Bryce Harper to treat every play like it's the World Series.

Juan Soto's heroics

New York Yankees right fielder Juan Soto (22) runs toward home plate to score a run against the Houston Astros during the third inning at Minute Maid Park.
Erik Williams-USA TODAY Sports

If any individual player has dialed up his intensity to midseason form and beyond, it's Juan Soto. All weekend long, Soto was making unbelievably clutch defensive plays, delivering back-breaking hits against the best bullpen arms the Astros have to offer, and fist-pumping in everyone's face. Soto has long been one of the best and most dynamic players in MLB, but with the added scrutiny of playing in the Bronx, he appears poised to catapult his superstardom to a whole new level.

We all knew Soto would continue to be excellent on the stat sheet. He's got a hit tool few can rival across the game and the plate discipline of a young Barry Bonds. But it's his immediate embrace of the New York spotlight, his love for the big moment, that has all of Yankees nation beaming this Monday morning. There's still no guarantee he stays beyond this season, but maybe Juan Soto really was born to be a Yankee.

Edwin Díaz's triumphant return

The New York Mets' Edwin Díaz may not be the best closer in MLB since Mariano Rivera, but he's certainly the most impactful. No closer since Mo has meant more to a franchise than Díaz does to the Mets right now, and none has had a more iconic entrance.

When Díaz tore his patellar tendon in the 2023 World Baseball Classic, even fans with no soft spot whatsoever for the Mets were devastated they wouldn't get to see his goosebump-inducing walks through the bullpen gates to Blasterjaxx and Timmy Trumpet's “Narco.” On Saturday, we all finally got back what we'd lost for far too long.

Even down 7-5 against the Brewers heading into the ninth, the Mets brought in Díaz in front of a home crowd desperate for some good vibes. The minute the opening beats of “Narco” hit, Citi Field absolutely erupted. Emotions ran high as a player who had a season ripped away from him in the prime of his career made his way back to a Big League mound. And when Díaz punctuated the inning with a strikeout of rookie phenom Jackson Chourio, it even felt like there was a real chance the Mets might come back in the bottom frame and win the game.

Baseball is at its best when it has all its stars shining together, and Díaz is a star unlike any other in the game right now.

The Tigers' wacky new dugout prop

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One of the most popular fads across Major League Baseball in the past couple of seasons has been the coordinated home run celebration, often with the aid of one or more props. It really took off with the Red Sox' laundry cart rides in 2021, which was soon joined by the Blue Jays' home run jacket, then exploded in 2023 with over half of the league's teams debuting their own unique home run celebrations. There was a time, in fact, that this very author endeavored to rank those MLB celebrations as the trend was truly exploding. Now, just three days into a new season, we already have a new addition to the ranks.

The Detroit Tigers, who last season celebrated home runs with a Red Wings helmet and a hockey stick (which would have ranked wayyyyy down at the bottom of the aforementioned celebration rankings), came out of nowhere with an homage to Detroit-based pizza chain Little Caesars, toting three gigantic floppy felt pizzas on a five-foot-long spear. It's so silly and such a shameless case of vertical integration (Little Caesars is owned by the Ilitch family, who also owns the Tigers AND the Red Wings), that one can't help but tip their cap. Here's to a summer full of dingers and pizza spears at Comerica Park.

Walk-offs. Enough said.

Even with all these other fantastic moments unfolding around MLB this Opening Weekend, no moment brought back the nostalgia of a fiercely contested baseball pennant race quite like Christian Encarnacion-Strand's walk-off homer to win the Reds their first series of 2024. The Great American Ball Park crowd had already been electrified by Will Benson's two-run bomb to tie it seconds beforehand, and then C.E.S. sent the place into bedlam.

Sure, Jonah Heim had already had his walk-off single on Opening Day, while Julio Rodríguez sent Mariners fans home happy with a single on Saturday. Even the Oakland A's got in on the fun with a game-ending walk to Abraham Toro with the bases loaded on Sunday. But ending a game with a moonshot, followed by a mob at the plate, still hits different. The moment the ball left Encarnacion-Strand's bat, it became clear beyond a shadow of a doubt: baseball truly is back.