CLEVELAND — Between Craig Albernaz and Stephen Vogt, the highest expression of their long friendship that has crisscrossed the nation’s ballparks might just be the pranks they pull on each other.

On Thursday, when the Orioles started a four-game series with the Guardians, it was Vogt’s turn to get the upper hand. Albernaz arrived at Progressive Field — where he spent the previous two seasons as Vogt’s right-hand man — to find the visiting manager’s office had been turned kid size.

Kid-size desk. Kid-size chairs. In the bathroom, the shower curtain was Spider-Man themed. Other decor was pulled from the children’s show “Bluey.” The rookie skipper was given a baby’s first manager set.

Albernaz admitted the Cleveland staff and Vogt had gotten the better of him, but he was determined not to surrender.

“I’m gonna have Willie, the clubby here, package everything up and send it back to Baltimore, and make sure Vogty gets the shipping receipt so he can pay for it,” Albernaz snickered. “You know, he’s two-time Manager of the Year. He can go off his wallet one time.”

There is a devilish sense of play between the two teammates-turned-coaches-turned opponents. But there is also a deep sense of caring. Vogt, after all, sat in the front row at Albernaz’s introductory news conference at Camden Yards — in enemy territory, as it were.

Albernaz felt the softer side of that relationship too this week after taking a screaming line drive to his right cheek, which fractured his jaw and orbital bone under his eye. Even though the Guardians had prepared a kind of red carpet treatment for Albernaz’s return, they quickly sent out a flood of well wishes for the beloved former Cleveland assistant.

“When we heard the news about Alby’s injury, I think he probably got about 100 text messages from Cleveland people who care about him, making sure he was OK,” Vogt said. “And then, as soon as he said it was OK, the jokes started flying in.”

The most common one, according to Albernaz: “You should have caught it.”

Albernaz is still very much ailing from Jeremiah Jackson’s foul ball. For the next six weeks, he cannot blow his nose. Solid foods are out; smoothies and soups are in. He can’t sleep on his right side, which is tricky for a man who has to find ways to get comfortable in hotel beds.

Injury aside, the dominant emotion for Albernaz upon his return to Progressive Field was gratitude. Without his two-year stint as Vogt’s bench coach and then associate manager, Albernaz said, he would have never been as prepared to be a first-time manager in Baltimore.

It was the interview process to be the Guardians’ manager that felt like the first tangible sign he could truly manage in the big leagues. When the job went to Vogt, who was a longtime friend from their days as players in the Tampa Bay Rays organization, it was the next-best thing to getting it himself.

Vogt used the position to help groom his friend to be a manager, including him on back-end conversations with the front office that bench coaches aren’t always invited to. The experience, Albernaz said, has proved invaluable to him in Baltimore.

“I kind of got to learn firsthand of, like, what it actually entails to be a manager day to day,” he said. “And that’s the biggest thing when you take the job. … You kind of just bank on your experience, but my experience in Cleveland led me to this point where I know, like, what it looks like behind the scenes.”

The hope for the Guardians is that the opportunities they afforded Albernaz don’t come back to bite them already in April. Both teams are in tightly contested American League divisions, and a swing in the series could help catapult — or bog down — either club as it looks to contend for a playoff spot.

It may not be surprising, in that light, that Vogt was surprisingly tight-lipped publicly about Albernaz, not even divulging the details of his prank himself. But that may just be because both men understand this series is much more about the teams than the managers. The strongest commonality between their styles is a focus on preparation with their players.

“I think it just comes from a place where we know how hard this game is,” Albernaz said. “We gotta make sure that each side is doing what they can do to win. It’s not so much of what the opposing dugout’s doing. It’s how we get our players prepared, ready to play, and that’s something that we kind of see through the same lenses.”

The games come first. All those unread texts Albernaz has to open from his well-wishers in Cleveland — those can wait a few more days.