Good morning, I’m Dan Gartland. The WNBA playoffs are off to a great start, huh?
In today’s SI:AM:
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Is another MVP next?
Stop me if you’ve heard this before: Shohei Ohtani just accomplished something no other player in baseball history ever has.
Ohtani’s solo home run in the eighth inning of Tuesday night’s game against the Phillies was his 50th of the season, which was significant for a couple of reasons. It gave him two straight 50-homer seasons, making him the first MLB player to accomplish that feat since Alex Rodriguez in 2001 and ’02. More impressively, Ohtani was also the Dodgers’ starting pitcher on Tuesday, throwing five hitless innings with five strikeouts. The five K’s brought his season total to 54, which makes him the first player in MLB history to hit 50 homers and strike out 50 batters in the same season.
Fifty strikeouts isn’t really all that impressive of a number. There have been 311 pitchers this season to tally at least that many punchouts. But the fact that Ohtani is the only member of both 50-50 clubs (homers/steals and homers/strikeouts) makes it a special achievement.
Tuesday night’s outing was Ohtani’s best pitching performance of the season. He’s been slowly working his way back from the elbow surgery that limited him to DH duty last season, gradually ramping up his workload so that he can be a potential ace in the postseason. The game against the Phillies marked the first time this season that Ohtani pitched at least five innings without allowing a run. The last time he did that was July 27, 2023.
Ohtani had only thrown 68 pitches when he was pulled from his no-hit bid after five innings. Maybe manager Dave Roberts should have left him in the game, because things went south for the Dodgers once the game was handed over to the bullpen.
What happened next was the perfect example of the Tungsten Arm O’Doyle meme that originated during Ohtani’s time on some mediocre Angels teams. In the sixth inning, reliever Justin Wrobleski gave up five straight hits, the last of which was a three-run homer, as a 4–0 Dodgers lead became a 5–4 deficit. Wrobleski was replaced by Edgardo Henriquez, who gave up another homer to make it 6–4.
Ohtani did his part to aid the comeback, making it 6–5 with his homer in the eighth, and the Dodgers tied the game later in the inning on Alex Call’s sacrifice fly. But the bullpen let them down again in the ninth as Blake Treinen allowed a three-run homer to Rafael Marchán with two outs. Phillies closer Jhoan Duran pitched an easy one-two-three bottom of the ninth to close out a 9–6 Philadelphia victory.
According to Josh Dubow of the Associated Press, the Dodgers are the first team since at least 1906 to have their starting pitcher throw five or more hitless innings and then have the bullpen surrender nine or more runs.
It was a brutal loss for the Dodgers, especially because every game matters a lot more for them than they thought it would at the beginning of the season. Los Angeles is 7–10 since Aug. 27 and currently locked in a tight NL West race with the Padres. The Dodgers have seen their lead in the division shrink from nine games on July 3 to just two. They’re still virtually assured of snagging a playoff spot, but the risk is falling from No. 3 seed to the No. 5 seed. The Phillies and Brewers have healthy leads over the Dodgers for the two first-round byes, but there’s still a significant benefit to winning the division. The winner of the NL West will have to play a best-of-three wild-card series, the same as whichever team ends up in the wild-card spot, but the difference is that the division winner will play all three games at home, while the wild-card team will have to go on the road. (The Cubs currently have a sizable lead over the Padres for the top wild-card spot and are in line to have home field advantage in that series.)
The bullpen has been a real sore spot for the Dodgers of late. Since Aug. 27, Los Angeles ranks 28th in the majors in Fangraphs bullpen WAR, better only than the Marlins and Rockies.
“They’re lacking confidence,” Roberts said of his relievers. “They all wanna pitch well, they all want the opportunities, and they’re not making good pitches when they need to. … I believe in the talent. But right now they just don’t have the confidence that they need to have to be consistent.”
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The top five…
… things I saw last night:
5. Shohei Ohtani’s nasty curveball to strike out Bryce Harper.
4. An unreal diving play by Mariners shortstop J.P. Crawford.
3. Cal Raleigh’s 55th and 56th homers of the season. The first one gave him sole possession of the record for most homers by a switch-hitter. The second tied Ken Griffey Jr.’s Mariners franchise record.
2. Jordan Lawlar’s swinging bunt to give the Diamondbacks a walk-off win over the Giants as they keep their playoff hopes alive.
1. Dominique Malonga’s go-ahead bucket for the Storm in their comeback win over the Aces. Seattle trailed by 14 points in the second half before coming back to snap Las Vegas’s 17-game winning streak and force a decisive Game 3.
This article was originally published on www.si.com as SI:AM | Another Milestone Season for Shohei Ohtani.
