The Los Angeles Dodgers didn’t officially begin the season with a six-man rotation, but have the means to easily make the transition at any point.
Despite an off day Thursday, the Dodgers are looking at some reshuffling with their starters and manager Dave Roberts revealed the ripple effect has Shohei Ohtani due to face the Toronto Blue Jays on April 8, according to Jack Harris of the California Post.
“It should be the last day of the road trip, yeah.”
The decision to push back Ohtani’s spot in the rotation is going to amount to seven days of rest between starts.
Ohtani is pitching with fewer restrictions compared to last season, Roberts still described the Dodgers’ plan for their two-way superstar as “fluid.”
The right-hander was excellent on the mound in his first start against the Cleveland Guardians. The workload was right around the maximum estimate the organization had in mind, with 87 pitches thrown across six innings.
Still, the Dodgers are likely to continue to exercise caution whenever possible when it comes to the health of their most valuable asset.
Ohtani is chasing a personal goal this season, hoping to be the first Japanese-born Cy Young Award winner. However, he’s made it clear to the organization and his teammates that he will always put what’s best for the team first. That includes heeding the advice of the training staff to give himself the best chance of avoiding time lost to injury.
Staying healthy to make enough starts and throw an adequate number of innings is the most significant obstacle Ohtani will have to overcome to achieve his goal.
The 166 innings Ohtani threw in 2022 were a career-high by a significant margin. He’s had two other seasons of around 130 innings in 2021 and 2023, but has not thrown many innings outside of those seasons due to injury.
Clayton Kershaw believes Shohei Ohtani can join rare group
While Ohtani is prioritizing team success, Clayton Kershaw nevertheless believes his former teammate is capable of achieving rare MLB history.
“I’m excited to see a full year of him on the mound as well as at the plate,” Kershaw said during his debut as an NBC analyst. “It would be pretty cool to see a Cy Young, MVP and World Series in one year. There’s a very real possibility he could do that.”
Doing so would put Ohtani in the same group as Sandy Koufax (1963) and Willie Hernández (1984) as the only players in MLB history to win a Cy Young Award, MVP and World Series title in the same season.
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