The Los Angeles Dodgers have a top-five starting rotation in terms of ERA this season, with Shohei Ohtani and Yoshinobu Yamamoto at the forefront of their success.
The pair of Japanese right-handers have combined to allow just seven runs in 43.2 innings of work across seven starts. Manager Dave Roberts believes the two pitchers will continue to push each other to be better throughout the season.
“I definitely think they will [make each other better],” Roberts said. “You know, iron sharpens iron. We got two great athletes, two great pitchers. I think it’s certainly, I’m not going to say a competition, but I do think that they both make each other better.”
Ohtani and Yamamoto have delivered a quality start each time they have stepped on the mound this season, and the Dodgers have a 5-2 record in those contests.
A substantial factor in their success is their ability to pitch in the truest sense of the word. Roberts likens their approach to that of an artist or craftsman.
“Yeah, and I do think that [Ohtani] looks at it as an art, as Yoshinobu does, and craft,” he said.
“And so it’s not just kind of trying to bully guys with the fastball. It’s kind of how you set guys up, front to back, east-west, and use your entire pitch mix. So those guys, the best pitchers, in my opinion, do look at it as an art.”
The one-two punch of Ohtani and Yamamoto gives the Dodgers a significant advantage over the other 29 teams in the majors, not even including Tyler Glasnow. That edge will only increase once Blake Snell returns from the 15-day injured list.
Shohei Ohtani meets with Nagasaki survivor
Prior to the Dodgers facing the Colorado Rockies at Coors Field on Saturday, the two-way star took the time to meet 100-year-old Momoyo Nakamoto Kelley, who survived the Nagasaki bombing during World War II in 1945
Ohtani had just completed a throwing session when Dodgers broadcaster Stephen Nelson told him of Kelley’s story. Manager Dave Roberts, Roki Sasaki and Rockies pitcher Tomoyuki Sugano — all natives of Japan — also posed for photos with the centenarian.
Kelley was 19 years old when the atomic bomb hit her Japanese hometown. She moved to the United States in the early 1950s and became a lifelong baseball fan.
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