Shohei Ohtani has not pitched in a game since 2023, when in addition to leading the league in all the cool batting stats he also struck out 11.4 per nine with a 1.061 WHIP in 23 starts. I was a witness to one of them.
On April 3, 2023, my now-ex and I had tickets to see Shohei. The Angels were bringing him to Seattle for a three-game series, and we weren't going to miss him. He did not disappoint.
Despite the nuke, we hadn't quite had our fill. So we went back two days later. It was a Wednesday day game, which meant the tickets were unreasonably cheap. Shohei would take the mound against my poor Mariners, and what he did to them I would not soon forget.
Just five times since he came to America, Shohei has exceeded 110 pitches, and this would be the fourth of them. The fifth time was the one-hitter in Detroit, where he hit two home runs on the other side of the day's doubleheader. This time he "only" went six innings, allowing three hits and one run while fanning eight Mariners, including all three that he faced in the sixth. That last part really stuck with me—he was out there past most modern starters' bedtime striking out the side.
A lot has changed in two years. Ohtani is no longer an Angel. Tom Murphy is no longer the best hitting catcher on the Mariners. I got a job, and both Ippei Mizuhara and that game's umpire, Pat Hoberg, have lost theirs due to gambling problems. Other things too, I'm sure. Now, Ohtani is set to pitch as an opener for Monday's game against the Padres, marking his first outing as a Dodger.
In essence, this is a glorified rehab start for a guy far too valuable as a hitter to be sent to the minors. But the Dodgers need Shohei's arm back in the worst possible way. Things are pretty dire right now. The Dodgers have eight hurlers on the IL, four with elbow problems and four more with shoulder concerns. Their "healthy" rotation is only four guys, and one of them is a senile geezer who still can't grasp the concept of Pride Night. (It's polite not to stare at him.)
As cool as Ohtani has been in the last year and change as a pure hitter, I found watching him pitch much cooler, even though his hitting is (usually) more superlative. If you're lucky enough to be at the park when he hits one out, that play is nevertheless over in a second or two. The way it feels to watch him, for a few hours, dismantle the lineup you spent the whole spring putting your hopes into—that will linger.
