CHICAGO — Jason Heyward, who launched a 16-year MLB career with his hometown Atlanta Braves in 2010 and won World Series championships with the Chicago Cubs in 2016 and the Los Angeles Dodgers in 2024, has retired from baseball.

“I wanted to reach this moment and know without a doubt that it was time to walk away, and I do. No second-guessing, no looking back, just gratitude,” Heyward, 36, said in a statement released Friday, when the last round of MLB teams — including the Braves — played their 2026 regular-season openers after other clubs got going Wednesday or Thursday.

Heyward played in 34 games with the San Diego Padres last season, hitting .176 before the team released him in June.

For his MLB career, spent mostly in the National League, Heyward hit .255 with 186 home runs while playing for six teams in all: the Braves (2010-14), St. Louis Cardinals (2015), Cubs (2016-22), Dodgers (2023-24), Houston Astros (2024) and Padres (2025). His 24 games with the Astros marked his only time with an American League club.

Primarily an outfielder, he won five Gold Gloves at that position, including four straight from 2014-17.

Heyward was known as a clubhouse leader in Los Angeles, and Dodgers manager Dave Roberts described him as “old school in the sense of always doing nice things for young players, buying dinners, buying stuff for them, showing them how to be a big leaguer.”

Heyward, whose nickname is “J-Hey,” homered on the first swing of his MLB career when he made his debut in Atlanta on April 5, 2010, and he set career highs with 27 home runs and 82 RBIs for the Braves in 2012. He was drafted by the Braves in 2007 from Henry County High School in McDonough, some 30 miles south of the Georgia capital.

Although originally from Ridgewood, New Jersey, his family moved to the Atlanta area soon after he was born.

Heyward’s longest tenure was with the Cubs, though, and he said he plans to focus on his eponymous youth development program based in Chicago.

Heyward said playing in the major leagues “gave me everything, and now I get to give some of that back. Through the Jason Heyward Baseball Academy, I get to mentor the next generation, keep my hands in the game, and make sure kids in my community have the opportunities and the space to dream the same way I did.”

Roberts, whose Dodgers are seeking to become the first team to win three straight World Series since the New York Yankees from 1998 to 2000, said he talked to Heyward during spring training.

Heyward indicated then that he wanted to stay in the sport in some capacity, and he certainly has Roberts’ backing.

Said the manager: “The game needs guys like Jason.”