{"id":2552,"date":"2026-05-08T09:02:46","date_gmt":"2026-05-08T09:02:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/siliconvalleymovingpost.com\/?p=2552"},"modified":"2026-05-08T09:02:46","modified_gmt":"2026-05-08T09:02:46","slug":"dodgers-living-with-new-version-of-shohei-ohtani-one-in-an-offensive-slump-4","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/siliconvalleymovingpost.com\/?p=2552","title":{"rendered":"Dodgers living with new version of Shohei Ohtani \u2013 one in an offensive slump"},"content":{"rendered":"<div>\n<p>HOUSTON \u2014 The Dodgers have seen different versions of Shohei Ohtani during his three seasons in Los Angeles.<\/p>\n<p>Read more <a href=\"https:\/\/siliconvalleymovingpost.com\/?p=2551\">JSerra softball tops Orange Lutheran again for share of first place<\/a><\/p>\n<p>They\u2019re seeing a new one this year \u2013 a slumping Ohtani.<\/p>\n<p>Through Tuesday, Ohtani was hitting .240 with an .814 OPS \u2013 numbers that would be career-lows for a full season should they persist that long and the lowest through his team\u2019s first 35 games in a season since 2022. He is hitless in his past 17 at-bats with just one home run in his past 85 plate appearances.<\/p>\n<p>Ohtani\u2019s at-bats looked so uncomfortable Monday night that Dodgers manager Dave Roberts changed direction and decided to keep him out of the lineup Tuesday and only use him as the starting pitcher.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI think he\u2019s just missing pitches that he should hit. He\u2019s not squaring them up,\u201d Roberts said. \u201cIn the last week, I think he\u2019s done a better job of controlling the chase. But now, pitches in the hitting zone I just think (he\u2019s) getting them off the end, getting beat on fastballs. Things like that, when he\u2019s right, just doesn\u2019t happen.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Roberts said he believes the extended slow start is directly related to the four-time league MVP taking on a full pitching workload for the first time since 2023.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI do,\u201d he said. \u201cWith pitching there\u2019s the day of the start, what it takes on your mind in the box, the day after you\u2019re hitting, the tax on your body and what you endured the day before, your outing. So that affects your hitting. That\u2019s two days there.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI feel very good about writing Shohei\u2019s name in the lineup every time. But I do think what he\u2019s done on the pitching side, how well he\u2019s pitched, there\u2019s been a little bit of fallback or whatever on the hitting. But I do think it will correct itself as time goes on.\u201d<\/p>\n<div>\n<\/div>\n<p>The toll is two-fold. The time Ohtani has to put into his pitching preparation takes away from the time where he could \u201cgo full bore working on his swing, grinding through it to right himself when his mechanics aren\u2019t where they should be,\u201d Roberts said. And there is also the simple fatigue of throwing 90-100 pitches every six days.<\/p>\n<p>That could be showing in Ohtani\u2019s bat speed. By Statcast measurement, Ohtani is averaging 74.8 mph this season, a mark that still puts him in the 82nd percentile of MLB hitters. But it is down a full mile per hour from last season and almost 3 mph from 2023 (the first year Statcast bat speed measurements are publicly available) when he ranked in the 99th percentile.<\/p>\n<p>Ohtani was also pitching full-time in 2023 when he averaged 77.4 mph on his swings. But he was also three years younger.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI haven\u2019t noticed it,\u201d Roberts said of the drop in bat speed so far this year. \u201cThat could probably play into the fact that he\u2019s getting beat on some pitches. But if you say that \u2026 then is that a sign of a little bit of fatigue in there?\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Read more <a href=\"https:\/\/siliconvalleymovingpost.com\/?p=2550\">Mater Dei\u2019s Gianna Kenrick, San Juan Hills\u2019 Braeden Valenzuela win CIF-SS diving titles<\/a><\/p>\n<div>\n<\/div>\n<p>Ohtani dismissed the idea that his workload as a full-time pitcher is the cause of his poor start.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI don\u2019t think so, personally, that pitching has been affecting my hitting,\u201d Ohtani said through his interpreter following Tuesday\u2019s game. \u201cAt the same time, it has been a little bit longer than my expectation (to get going), in terms of the hitting side of things. So, I\u2019ve been getting on base, which is a good thing. I just want to make sure that the quality of balls in play are better. And it\u2019s not ideal that I\u2019m trying to find that in the game (with less time to work in practice), but I just have to continue to do what I\u2019m supposed to do.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>When setting Ohtani\u2019s two-way schedule to keep him at full strength as much as possible, Roberts said \u201canything should be on the table\u201d \u2013 including giving him a full day off from both pitching and hitting occasionally.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s certainly up for consideration,\u201d he said. \u201cBut again, I don\u2019t know what the right answer is, outside of not playing him. Because we\u2019re better when he\u2019s in the lineup. He\u2019s still a presence. There\u2019s no pitcher out there that would not prefer to have him not in the lineup. But everything is on the table.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>What isn\u2019t on the table is any discussion of whether this is worth it to the Dodgers. Are Ohtani\u2019s pitching contributions worth a dropoff in his offensive production?<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI try not to get too far in the weeds on that. Because it\u2019s moot,\u201d Roberts said. \u201cHe\u2019s going to do both. He\u2019s one of our best pitchers. He\u2019s one of our best hitters. So I don\u2019t spend too much time on it. It\u2019s a good exercise for others. But not for me.\u201d<\/p>\n<h4>REHAB REPORT<\/h4>\n<p>Kik\u00e9 Hernandez began his minor-league rehabilitation assignment with Triple-A Oklahoma City on Tuesday night, playing third base for five innings and going 1 for 3 with a double. It was Hernandez\u2019s first game action since last year\u2019s World Series.<\/p>\n<p>Hernandez is recovering from elbow surgery last fall and is on the 60-day injured list, so his rehab assignment will be an extended one. He is not eligible to be activated from the IL until May 24.<\/p>\n<h4>UP NEXT<\/h4>\n<p>Dodgers (RHP Tyler Glasnow, 3-0, 2.56 ERA) at Astros (RHP Lance McCullers Jr., 2-2, 6.32 ERA), Wednesday, 11:10 a.m. PT, SportsNet LA, 570 AM<\/p>\n<p>Read more <a href=\"https:\/\/siliconvalleymovingpost.com\/?p=2549\">Nick\u2019s Restaurant to open new concept at River Street Marketplace<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Ohtani is hitting just .240 with only one home run in his past 85 plate appearances, and the extended slow start seems to be directly related to the increased toll of returning to a full pitching workload.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":839,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2552","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","category-verified-news"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.5 - 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