If Shohei Ohtani continues playing like this, he will establish another historic benchmark.
Two years after becoming the founding member of the 50-50 club, Ohtani has a chance to produce baseball’s first-ever 200-200 season: 200 strikeouts as a pitcher and 200 strikeouts as a hitter.
All of this is really just another way of saying Ohtani still isn’t hitting.
If Ohtani masks the Dodgers’ deficiencies when he’s at his best, he also magnifies them when he’s whiffing at the rate he is now.
The Dodgers have lost five of their last seven games, and Ohtani has struck out 11 times in that period, including three times in a 4-3 loss to the Chicago Cubs on Friday night. The defeat dropped the two-time defending World Series champions into second place in the National League West for the first time this season, a half-game behind the San Diego Padres.
Pointing to his track record as a slow starter, Ohtani has said he should be rounding into form offensively next month, but the Dodgers don’t have the luxury of waiting.
Their series-opening defeat to the Cubs renewed fears that in Edwin Diaz’s absence, their bullpen will be as combustible as it was last year, as their three most-trusted relievers combined to blow what was once a four-run lead.
Alex Vesia inherited a runner from starter Emmet Sheehan in the seventh inning and he scored. So did two runners Vesia allowed to reach base.
Blake Treinen served up a homer to Alex Bregman in the eighth inning and would have been charged with another run if not for a perfect throw by shortstop Hyeseong Kim to nail Ian Happ at the plate.
Tanner Scott gave up the game-deciding two-run homer to No. 9 hitter Dansby Swanson in the ninth inning.
Scott didn’t make any excuses for the down-the-middle fastball he threw to Swanson, saying only he and the team’s other relievers had to better next time.
“We got a good enough bullpen that we should win games,” he said.
Manager Dave Roberts remained optimistic about his Diaz-less bullpen but more or less admitted that he didn’t have any choice but to believe in the arms at his disposal.
There’s a possibility this was a fluke event. But there’s also a possibility that it wasn’t, and if that’s the case, the Dodgers will have to hit their way to victory.
That won’t happen often with this version of Ohtani as their leadoff hitter.
Ohtani has just one hit in his last 19 at-bats and is hitless in his last 13. He’s gone 51 plate appearances without a home run, his longest homer-less stretch in three seasons with the Dodgers.
Not hitting would be bad enough, but Ohtani hasn’t even looked as if he might hit.
With Ohtani temporarily not inspiring the degree of fear he typically does, the Dodgers’ lineup has changed for the worse. On Friday, they went ahead on a three-run homer by Will Smith in the third inning, tacked on another run in the fourth, and didn’t score again.
The Dodgers scored only four runs in their recent three-game series in San Francisco in which they lost twice.
In the last game in San Francisco, Roberts moved slumping Kyle Tucker from the No. 2 spot to cleanup and dropped Freddie Freeman in the two-hole directly behind Ohtani.
Freeman is 1 for 8 in his two games as the No. 2 hitter.
Of course, everything can change the moment Ohtani goes on a tear, and that’s a matter of when, not if. Roberts said he would wait for that to happen rather than drop him in the order.
“I think you also have to look at the alternative,” Roberts said. “Who else would you put up there?
“I think, for me, I’m just gonna keep betting on Shohei and kind of figure some things out.”
Roberts claimed he saw signs of improvement from Ohtani in his three-strikeout game.
“I thought today he was more disciplined on taking some borderline pitches,” Roberts said. “I really did.”
The argument wasn’t convincing, but who could blame Roberts for making it?
Because if Ohtani doesn’t start looking like himself in the batter’s box, the upcoming weeks could be particularly troublesome for the Dodgers.
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