‘It’s just not worth it’: Why the Dodgers won’t rush Ohtani — no matter their record

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2 months ago

August 15, 2025

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Alden GonzalezAug 15, 2025, 07:00 AM ET
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WHEN SUMMER ARRIVED and his pitching progression intensified, Shohei Ohtani essentially stopped running. In an attempt to preserve his body for the added stress it was about to endure, Ohtani stole just two bases throughout June and July.

Now, even as he approaches the workload of a traditional starting pitcher, the aggressiveness that helped make him the first 50/50 player in baseball history is showing up again. In 12 games in August, Ohtani has attempted five steals, a shift Los Angeles Dodgers manager Dave Roberts attributes to the urgency of this moment. The Dodgers are reeling, Ohtani is looking to maximize his opportunities to help, and so he’s forcing action.

It’s a small part of a bigger conflict — between what Ohtani can do and what the Dodgers believe he should.

Ohtani has established himself as the Dodgers’ best hitter and has quickly become one of their best pitchers, but the convergence of those skills has come at a time of competing interests. On one side is a bullpen in shambles, an offense in disarray and a nine-game division lead that has been reduced to a one-game deficit — to a San Diego Padres team the Dodgers will host this weekend — in a span of six weeks. On the other is a man still getting reacclimated to a two-way role, and a team hell-bent on preserving his health.

On Wednesday night, in the middle of what became the Dodgers’ fourth straight loss, Ohtani pitched into the fifth inning for the first time since a near-two-year hiatus from pitching. With that, he also approached a limit. Getting stretched to six innings this season is “unlikely,” Roberts said. Extending beyond that is practically out of the question, no matter what occurs over this next month and a half.

The Dodgers, still analyzing how Ohtani the pitcher impacts Ohtani the hitter, are trying to keep the long term front of mind.

“It’s not easy when you’re kind of in it, and you’re competing, but he’s just such a valuable player to us offensively, as a pitcher, and so to push for an extra inning, or call it five extra innings in totality — it’s just not worth it,” Roberts said. “There’s just way too much downside, instead of just staying the course. We all feel comfortable with our plan right now.”

IN THE WAKE of his first Tommy John surgery, during the COVID-19-shortened 2020 season, Ohtani struggled mightily while resuming a two-way role. In two starts spanning 1⅔ innings, he allowed seven runs. In 153 at-bats, he tallied 29 hits. This time, success has been almost immediate. Ohtani has continued to produce like one of the game’s best offensive players and has also put up a 3.47 ERA, with 32 strikeouts and only five walks, through his first 23⅓ innings as a pitcher.

He is throwing the hardest fastball of his career, averaging 98.3 mph, and is getting incredible results from his slider, which carries a whiff rate of 56.5% and an expected slugging percentage of .134. Ohtani threw several variations of cutters and sliders during his previous run as a two-way player from 2021 to 2023, in addition to the more horizontal sweeper. One of his current sliders, Dodgers pitching coach Mark Prior said, has been thrown with more downward movement to complement a splitter he still doesn’t have great feel for. It speaks to some of the traits that have resonated with Prior while working more closely with Ohtani this season — an analytical bent, a knack for quickly applying intel and an ability to deviate when needed.

“He’s got that trait,” Prior said. “He’s able to put things into practice. And when things aren’t working, he’s still able to find ways to beat you.”

Ohtani pitched from the stretch during every one of his 86 prior starts with the Angels and continued to do so as he progressed to bullpen sessions with the Dodgers last year. Then, to the surprise of the team’s coaches, he arrived in spring training and began pitching out of the windup, explaining it as a way to feel more athletic and less stagnant while coming off a second repair of his ulnar collateral ligament. As an added benefit, others noted, it would force him to incorporate more of his lower half and thus place less stress on his right arm.

The process played out methodically. Spring training acted as Ohtani’s offseason throwing program. When the team returned from a season-opening trip to Japan around the middle of March, he basically built back up again from scratch. His pitching debut occurred on June 16, about two months earlier than anticipated, because Ohtani preferred to rehab in major league environments. In a one-inning start, Ohtani reached his optimal fastball velocity with ease. It gave him confidence that he could continue to make steps forward.

The ensuing weeks only fortified that. “Really the fact that I can pitch and throw pain free is something I’ve grown to really be grateful for,” Ohtani, speaking through an interpreter, said during the All-Star Game. “This time around, it’s been a lot more smooth, and I’m really happy that I’m able to just do what I’ve always been able to do.” After one inning in his first two starts, Ohtani increased to two innings in his third and fourth and followed it with back-to-back three-inning outings. He was scheduled for four innings on a humid afternoon in Cincinnati on July 30, but his lower half cramped, prompting an earlier exit. Seven days later, Ohtani put together his best start of the year against the St. Louis Cardinals, allowing one run — on two batted balls that did not leave the infield — while striking out eight in four innings.

The original plan called for him to once again take down four innings against the Angels on Wednesday, but the Dodgers, encouraged by his progress, upped it to five. Ohtani allowed two runs in the bottom of the second, then struck out Luis Rengifo with a nasty splitter to begin the fifth. Back-to-back singles and a double followed, placing the tying run in scoring position and prompting Ohtani’s exit after a season-high 80 pitches. His ERA stood at 2.74 when the inning began and rose by almost a full run by the time it ended.

It was another reminder that Ohtani, while effective and dynamic, is still getting used to this.

“I don’t think he’s there yet,” Roberts said recently. “I think it’s only going to get better as he gets more time doing it.”

TEOSCAR HERNÁNDEZ, LIKE many others, spent years wondering how Ohtani prepared as both a hitter and pitcher on his start days. Since becoming his teammate, he has been surprised by the process’s simplicity.

“I thought it was going to take a lot more work for him to get ready for that day,” Hernández said, “but I think it’s actually less when he’s pitching. It’s like he’s saving a lot of energy for when he has to go on the mound.” Roberts has noticed “more edge” on the days when Ohtani starts, saying he “transforms into a different type of person.” Pitching takes priority on those days. Hitting is secondary, which seems to come at a cost. Ohtani is slashing .284/.391/.629 with 17 steals and a National League-leading 43 home runs this season — numbers that, without even accounting for his pitching, should put him in line for his fourth MVP in five years. But Ohtani is only a .222 hitter on his start days, going 8-for-36 with 17 strikeouts. It’s a small sample size, but it might not be a coincidence.

“When he’s pitching, there’s an added emphasis, understandably so, on pitching,” Roberts said. “I don’t think there’s a better option, as far as not playing him or having somebody else [in the lineup]. I think that there’s a calibration that needs to happen — that’s going to happen.”

The Dodgers’ coaches organize a one-sheet scouting report tailored to both the opponent and what their starting pitchers prioritize in the days leading up to their start, then convene for a meeting hours before the first pitch. That process is no different for Ohtani, Prior said. The added element of incorporating hitting takes buy-in from other players, specifically with regard to usage of the indoor batting cages and training rooms. The goal on those days, Prior added, is to “make sure that his day is seamless all the way through.”

Ohtani’s consistency and efficiency help that cause, but it doesn’t take away from the challenge of it.

“It’s really difficult,” Dodgers starter Blake Snell said. “It’s tough to focus on both because it’s so much work getting ready for a pitcher, knowing what they can do. He has to know that, and he needs to know every hitter, too, so it’s extremely difficult. I think it’s going to take time for him to figure out his ways of, ‘How am I going to do this?'”

Even if the offensive production on his start days has been relatively scant, Ohtani’s presence in the lineup has been significant. In the third inning of his eighth start on Aug. 6, he hit a two-run homer that temporarily gave the Dodgers the lead. In the first inning of his ninth start a week later, he led off with a triple, then came around to score. The Dodgers lost both of those games, a product of a bullpen that is exceedingly shorthanded and an offense that has been too inconsistent to make up for it.

Even as a fully formed two-way player, Ohtani can’t do it all by himself — and the Dodgers wouldn’t let him anyway.

Every inning, it seems, has a cost. “For me, my eyes, first year pitching again, what we’re doing right now — essentially, it’s house money,” Roberts said. “It’s additive, being a two-way player. We have to be mindful of Shohei now and also going forward.”

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2025 ALCS: Live updates and analysis from Game 3

Published

6 hours ago

October 16, 2025

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2025 ALCS: Live updates and analysis from Game 3

Oct 15, 2025, 10:45 PM ET

If the Toronto Blue Jays are going to bounce back, tonight’s the night.

After Toronto lost two at home to the Seattle Mariners, the American League Championship Series heads West for Game 3.

The first matchup at T-Mobile Park isn’t an elimination game, but the stakes couldn’t be much higher. It’s essentially a must-win for the top-seeded Blue Jays; only one team in MLB history has ever come back from trailing a postseason series 3-0. Meanwhile, for the Mariners, it’s a chance to get one victory away from the first World Series appearance in franchise history.

Stay here for our coverage — from the pregame lineups to the top moments during the game to our takeaways and analysis after the final pitch.

Key links: How Vlad Jr., Jays bet on each other | LCS update | Bracket

Top moments

Follow live for pitch-by-pitch coverage

Seattle goes back-to-back in the 8th for first runs since 1st inning

Randy Arozarena and Cal Raleigh go back-to-back!

(MLB x @CitizenWatchUS) pic.twitter.com/sOzVyH0Cvo

— MLB (@MLB) October 16, 2025

It’s raining homers! Alejandro Kirk‘s 3-run mash makes it 12-2

KIRK’S TURN! #WANTITALL pic.twitter.com/wv6UXOcHrU

— Toronto Blue Jays (@BlueJays) October 16, 2025

Vlad Jr. adds own home run as Jays pile on

VLADIMIR GUERRERO JR. WITH A BLAST OF HIS OWN! #ALCS pic.twitter.com/cSLgLywe1V

— MLB (@MLB) October 16, 2025

Daulton Varsho‘s 2-RBI double caps off 5-run inning for Toronto

Daulton Varsho makes it a 5-run inning for the @BlueJays! pic.twitter.com/lbrDBbr4ei

— MLB (@MLB) October 16, 2025

Blue Jays answer with their own blast — and now we’re tied

Andrés Giménez ties the game! #ALCS pic.twitter.com/drtdQh8gQ1

— MLB (@MLB) October 16, 2025

J-Rod hits 2-run home run to give M’s early lead

JULIO RODRÍGUEZ 2-RUN BLAST! #ALCS pic.twitter.com/olXcF7mzh4

— MLB (@MLB) October 16, 2025

Josh Naylor rocking a vintage KD jersey ahead of Game 3

Good luck @Mariners…good throwback Josh https://t.co/26FrDN4UNO

— Kevin Durant (@KDTrey5) October 15, 2025

Lineups

Seattle leads series 2-0

Starting pitchers: Shane Bieber vs. George Kirby

Toronto

1. George Springer (R) DH
2. Nathan Lukes (L) LF
3. Vladimir Guerrero Jr. (R) 1B
4. Anthony Santander (S) RF
5. Alejandro Kirk (R) C
6. Daulton Varsho (L) CF
7. Addison Barger (L) 3B
8. Ernie Clement (R) 2B
9. Andres Gimenez (L) SS

Seattle

1. Randy Arozarena (R) LF
2. Cal Raleigh (S) C
3. Julio Rodriguez (R) CF
4. Jorge Polanco (S) 2B
5. Josh Naylor (L) 1B
6. Eugenio Suarez (R) 3B
7. Dominic Canzone (L) DH
8. Victor Robles (R) RF
9. J.P. Crawford (L) SS

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How Vlad Jr. and the Blue Jays bet on each other — and won

Published

9 hours ago

October 16, 2025

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How Vlad Jr. and the Blue Jays bet on each other -- and won

Jorge CastilloOct 15, 2025, 07:00 AM ET
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SIX MONTHS AGO, just seven games into the 2025 season, the Toronto Blue Jays arrived in Queens with uncertainty hovering over Vladimir Guerrero Jr.’s future. New York Mets fans, hopeful that their team could eventually land the impending free agent and partner him with Juan Soto, welcomed the first baseman with notably loud cheers at Citi Field to open the weekend series. Guerrero and the Blue Jays had failed to reach an agreement on a contract extension before an arbitrary mid-February deadline, and the drama would not die.

Then, suddenly, it did, hours after the Mets completed a weekend sweep. The deal was historic: 14 years, $500 million without deferrals, the third-largest contract in Major League Baseball history. The Canadian-born Guerrero, signed out of the Dominican Republic as a 16-year-old with a famous name, would be a Blue Jay for life. Guerrero bet on himself by turning down smaller offers and bet on the Blue Jays by agreeing not to test free agency. And the Blue Jays bet on the homegrown star at a massive price, having whiffed on other marquee talents in recent years. The impact was instant.

“We didn’t start playing our best baseball until May,” Blue Jays starter Max Scherzer said. “But if that didn’t get settled, it would be this cloud hanging over our season the whole time. The fact that that was resolved just kind of settled everything down. The outside attention is resolved. It’s no longer, ‘What’s going to happen here?’ It kind of took the elephant out of the room.”

Guerrero, 26, responded with his fifth All-Star season, batting .292 with 23 home runs and an .848 OPS in 156 games. His play, coupled with rebound seasons from George Springer and Bo Bichette and a deep roster of contributors, fueled the Blue Jays’ ascension from 74 wins and last place in 2024 to 94 wins, an American League East title and, now, Game 3 of the American League Championship Series.

The Blue Jays can point to a few possible turning points on their way to a fourth playoff appearance in six years. There was a three-game sweep in Seattle in early May. There was Bichette’s pinch-hit, go-ahead home run in the ninth inning in Texas later that month. But Guerrero’s agreement a week into the season helped pave the way to where the Blue Jays find themselves Wednesday: four wins shy of their first World Series appearance in 32 years.

Down 2-0 after the Mariners dominated the first two games in Toronto, it’s no easy feat. But the goal Guerrero has set for himself hasn’t changed.

“For me my goal always is to win a World Series, to bring the World Series here,” Guerrero said earlier this postseason. “My father, he never had the chance to win a World Series. That’s one of my goals, always been one of my goals, to do that for me, for him.”

THE JOURNEY TO this breakout postseason for Guerrero and the Blue Jays began more than a decade ago. In January 2015, months before Guerrero was eligible to sign as an international free agent, Edwin Encarnación received a call from Alex Anthopoulos, then Toronto’s general manager: The Blue Jays wanted to see a 15-year-old Guerrero, their top target that year, work out again in the Dominican Republic — and they needed to find a ballpark.

Encarnación, coming off an All-Star season for Toronto in 2014, reached out to his contacts and a workout was arranged to have Guerrero face older free agents from Cuba. With Encarnación and Blue Jays officials, including Anthopoulos and international scouting director Ismael Cruz looking on, Guerrero convinced the decision-makers.

“It was something special,” Encarnación said in Spanish on the field at Rogers Centre on Monday before Game 2 of the ALCS. “Vladdy was better than the Cubans. This kid, at 15 years old, showed off against them. He was special.”

That July, the Blue Jays used their entire international bonus pool to sign Guerrero for $3.9 million. Worried about the hoopla that came with being the son of a future Hall of Famer, Anthopoulos asked the team’s media department to hold a low-key event when Guerrero, born in Montreal during his father’s time starring for the Expos, was brought to Toronto for the first time. No news conference at the podium. Just batting practice on the field.

“I was concerned with the last name, the hype and the expectations were going to be out of this world,” said Anthopoulos, now general manager of the Atlanta Braves. “And they were anyway, as much as we tried to play it down.”

Guerrero was not immune to the pressure upon arriving for his major league debut in 2019 as the top prospect across baseball at just 20 years old. The years that followed were not a linear progression. After an AL MVP runner-up season in which he clubbed 48 home runs with a 1.002 OPS in 2021, his first year as a full-time first baseman, Guerrero hit 58 home runs with an .804 OPS over the next two years. Then came another breakout last season: a .323/.396/.544 slash line with 30 home runs in 159 games to raise his value heading into his platform year.

“He’s not easily distracted,” Blue Jays general manager Ross Atkins said. “He’s still very human, and I think the hardest part, from my perspective and my view, that Vladdy’s had to deal with is the expectation. Not the distractions off the field or the attention. And he embraced the expectations.”

This year, the pressure was on Guerrero to finally perform to those expectations in the postseason. He entered the AL Division Series against the New York Yankees 3-for-22 with two walks, five strikeouts and no home runs in six career playoff games — all losses — spread over three separate wild-card series.

Guerrero quickly discarded that history in Game 1, swatting a solo home run in his first plate appearance of the postseason. In Game 2, he cracked a grand slam that will long be replayed on Rogers Centre highlight reels. He finished the series 9-for-17 with three home runs and nine RBIs as the Blue Jays eliminated New York in four games.

“I think he’s improved a lot in all aspects,” Blue Jays catcher Alejandro Kirk said. “The experience, how he’s matured as a person. He’s no longer the 20-year-old Vladimir when he debuted. Now he’s Vladimir.”

VLADIMIR VASQUEZ WATCHED the Blue Jays close out the Yankees last Wednesday from his restaurant 5 miles north of Rogers Centre. Born in the Dominican Republic, Vasquez moved to Toronto when he was 11 years old in 1990 and quickly became a fan of the early-’90s Blue Jays championship teams. He opened Cabacoa, a Dominican restaurant, a year-and-a-half ago — a sign of the city’s growing Dominican community.

“I’ve been following Vladimir Guerrero Jr. since he was in the minors,” Vasquez said. “It’s funny because his dad was the only older Dominican Vladimir I knew growing up. But it’s important for the community, for the Dominican community, to have somebody who’s that good who’s going to be here long term.”

It’s part of the responsibility Guerrero shoulders beyond playing first base and batting third. He’s the only Canadian citizen on Canada’s only MLB team. His No. 27 jersey is the one Blue Jays fans wear from British Columbia to Newfoundland. He’s the player the Blue Jays committed to as their cornerstone through his age-40 season in 2039 — 20 years after his debut — with hopes he’ll end up with his own Hall of Fame career.

“I look at Vladdy long term because I’ve gotten to play with the greats,” said Scherzer, an 18-year veteran and three-time Cy Young Award winner. “I’ve gotten to play with so many great, different players over my career. For me, he kind of fits this Prince Fielder-Miguel Cabrera mold. He’s kind of a hybrid between those two.”

In the short term, the agreement was an exhale. Perhaps, as Atkins said he’d like to think, the Blue Jays would’ve found their footing without Guerrero signing the extension. The pieces were in place two years removed from an 89-win season. But that variable, which had lingered from the day Guerrero reported for spring training, was removed.

Six months later, the Blue Jays, behind their franchise pillar, are breaking through.

“I think it kind of showed our fan base and the league kind of what we’re trying to do here short and long term,” Blue Jays manager John Schneider said. “And it just kind of clears a little bit of a cloud around a really good player and allows the team to say, ‘OK, this is our guy, this is what we’re going to do.’ I think it kind of freed everyone up.”