Box score of the day: Piazza, Sosa slug in Japan

Think back to the turn of the millennium. Do you remember Opening Day Y2K?

It was 20 years ago today. On March 29, 2000, the Mets and Cubs opened up the Major League Baseball season at the Tokyo Dome -- the first time MLB went overseas for a regular-season game.

The Mets lost the opener, 5-3, but it was also the start of a National League pennant run for them. They went on to face the crosstown-rival Yankees in the Subway Series Fall Classic. The Cubs, winners in Tokyo, took the opposite trajectory, finishing last in the NL Central, and tied with the Phillies for the worst record in MLB.

But back to Opening Day. The game, played in front of a crowd of 55,000, is a fun one to look back on today as we wait for baseball to return. Just take a gander at Mets starter Mike Hampton's stat line: The lefty held the Cubs to two runs in five innings despite an incredible nine walks -- none intentional -- plus one hit-by-pitch, one wild pitch and only one strikeout. Can you even imagine that happening today?

And there's more. Let's turn back the clock two decades and check out Opening Day 2000 for today's box score of the day.

Players of the game: Sammy Sosa, RF, Cubs / Mike Piazza, C, Mets

The headliners of this game were Slammin' Sammy, coming off back-to-back 60-homer seasons, and Hall of Famer Piazza, who'd just crushed 40 home runs in 1999. The two superstar sluggers didn't disappoint. Sosa and Piazza put on a show for the hosts in Tokyo.

Sosa didn't homer on Opening Day, but the Cubs' cleanup man ripped a double, finished 2-for-3 and reached base four times in Chicago's victory. The home runs would come, as Sosa bashed 50 in 2000 to lead the Majors.

Piazza did provide fireworks for New York. He crushed an opposite-field home run -- featuring a smooth bat drop as he watched it go -- to make it a close game in the eighth. Piazza's 2-for-4 day was the start of one of his greatest seasons. He hit .324 with 38 home runs and finished third in NL MVP voting.

Remember him? Rey Ordóñez, SS, Mets

Back in the late '90s, Ordó?ez was the slickest-fielding shortstop around. Entering Opening Day 2000, the Mets infielder had won three consecutive Gold Glove Awards from 1997-99, taking over from Barry Larkin, who had won the previous three years.

Ordó?ez played 45 games in 2000, as a broken arm, sustained while making a tag at the end of May, cost him the season and his chance at playing in the Fall Classic. And unfortunately, he was never the same after that. But Ordó?ez did show off his fielding aplomb by turning a nifty double play in the second inning of the Tokyo Dome opener, making it the only inning where Hampton didn't have to wiggle out of a jam.

He wore THAT uniform? Rickey Henderson, LF, Mets

Yes, that's a 40-year-old Man of Steal leading off for the Mets on Opening Day 2000. Henderson played 3,081 games in his Hall of Fame career; only 152 of them were as a Met. He didn't join the team until 1999, when he'd already played 20 seasons, and he was released shortly after the Tokyo Dome opener in May.

But Henderson actually had a pretty good, albeit short, run with the Mets. Wearing No. 24, the first Mets regular to do so since Willie Mays retired, Henderson hit .315 and stole 37 bases in 1999 and was named the Sporting News' Comeback Player of the Year. He didn't steal a base on Opening Day 2000, but Henderson did notch a hit and a walk against the Cubs.

Before he was big: Joe Girardi, C, Cubs

Girardi wasn't exactly a nobody in 2000, as he'd won three World Series with the Yankees and caught Dwight Gooden's no-hitter and David Cone's perfect game. But he's even more prominent now as a manager. While the coronavirus outbreak has pushed back Girardi's debut as the Phillies skipper, Girardi won the 2006 NL Manager of the Year Award with the Marlins and led the Yankees to six postseason appearances and the 2009 World Series championship in his decade at the helm.

Back in 2000, he was nearing the tail end of his playing career as a catcher. The 35-year-old Girardi had just won his last World Series ring as a player in '99 before re-signing with the Cubs, his original MLB team, as a free agent. Girardi went 3-for-4 against the Mets on Opening Day and went on to earn his only career All-Star nod that season.

Last call: Mark Grace, 1B, Cubs

Grace spent the first 13 seasons of his 16-year career in Chicago, anchoring the Cubs at first base through the 1990s. Grace was a three-time All-Star and four-time Gold Glover with the Cubs, and he was the runner-up for 1988 NL Rookie of the Year.

The 2000 season was the end of his Cubs tenure. Grace started it off with a bang, launching an eighth-inning home run to give the Cubs an insurance run. He hit .280 with 11 homers and 82 RBIs in his age-36 season before playing out his final few years with the D-backs, where he got his only World Series ring on the 2001 team that shocked the Yankees.