When the Chicago Cubs break camp after spring training in Mesa, Arizona, next week, Garrett Cooper will go with them.

The former Auburn standout signed a minor-league contract with the Cubs that included an invitation to big-league camp on March 2, and with two home runs and a .500 slugging percentage in 10 Cactus League games, Cooper made his way onto Chicago’s 26-player regular-season roster to open the 2024 campaign.

Cubs manager Craig Counsell said on Saturday that Cooper had made the opening-day roster.

A member of the National League team at the 2022 MLB All-Star Game, Cooper batted .251 with 17 home runs in 123 games last season. Cooper played 82 games for the Miami Marlins and 41 games for the San Diego Padres for a career-high 123 in 2023. The Marlins traded Cooper, Pensacola Blue Wahoos reliever Sean Reynolds and cash for Padres pitcher Ryan Weathers on Aug. 1.

During his MLB career, Cooper has appeared in 265 games at first base, 114 at designated hitter, 75 in right field and six in left field.

Cooper is a right-handed hitter, while the Cubs’ other two first-base candidates, Cody Bellinger and Michael Busch, swing left-handed. Cooper’s career batting average is 26 points higher and career slugging percentage is 57 points higher against left-handed pitchers than against right-handed pitchers.

Chicago opens its regular-season schedule against the Texas Rangers at 6:35 p.m. CDT Thursday at Globe Life Stadium in Arlington, Texas.

Cooper batted .340 with a .503 slugging percentage during his two seasons at Auburn. He left the Tigers as a sixth-round draft pick of the Milwaukee Brewers in 2013.

Cooper reached the big leagues in 2017 with the New York Yankees. Thirteen games into his Major League career, Cooper had a .326 batting average as a summer callup when hamstring tendinitis sidelined him for the rest of the season.

Traded to Miami after the 2017 season, Cooper played in only 14 games in 2018 because of two wrist injuries. In 2019, he played in 107 games even though he took a pitch on his left hand in his first game off the injured list from a calf strain. In the shortened 2020 season, Cooper missed 26 of the 60 games on the COVID-19 list.

In 2021, Cooper had Tommy John surgery after suffering an elbow injury when an errant throw put him in the path of a baserunner at first, limiting him to 71 games.

After his All-Star Game appearance, Cooper went to the injured list three times before the end of the 2022 season because of a wrist injury, a concussion and a broken finger.

In 481 MLB games, Cooper has a .268 batting average, .337 on-base average and .435 slugging percentage. He has hit 56 home runs.

Mark Inabinett is a sports reporter for Alabama Media Group. Follow him on Twitter at @AMarkG1.