OHTANI INJURED A SHOULDER FOR NO GOOD REASON, AS DODGERS TAKE A 2-0 LEAD
A perfect two nights suddenly turned to another scare, when Ohtani tried to steal second base with a three-run lead and suffered a partial dislocation that could impact the remainder of the Series
Why was Shohei Ohtani trying to steal second base? His supernatural act defied all logic Saturday night. The Dodgers led Game 2 of the World Series by three runs. They had to quiet the Yankees only in the eighth and ninth innings. What was the point of reminding us, with feet first, that he amassed 59 thefts in the regular season?
The boys in blue are not perfect, after all.
They must pray the subluxation of Ohtani’s left shoulder is merely a complex word for a partial dislocation, meaning he’ll be in the lineup Monday night in New York. The Dodgers are up two games to zip and hope to close out a championship sooner than later, which might not take place if Ohtani is sidelined. They won because Yoshinobu Yamamoto performed like the highest-paid pitcher in baseball history, allowing one hit in 6 1/3 innings. They won because Freddie Freeman homered again and might be in line for the MVP award, not bad for someone who barely could walk days ago. They won the game, 4-2, because Tommy Edman and Teoscar Hernandez also homered.
Yet why was Ohtani sprawled on the field and holding his left arm, gone for the third out after jamming his hand in the dirt? At least it wasn’t his right arm, which might have impacted his comeback next year as a pitcher. Why did he take several moments before climbing to his feet? Why wouldn’t Dodger Stadium be numb in shock as he was helped into the clubhouse by assistant athletic trainer Yosuke Nakajima?
“The scene, very concerning,” manager Dave Roberts said.
“The whole stadium went silent,” Hernandez said. “You know how big Shohei is for this team.”
The good news: He did not wear a sleeve on his shoulder as he left the ballpark. NHK, which broadcasts games in Japan, referred to the injury as a shoulder popping out. The Dodgers have suffered extraordinary injuries this season, including Freeman, Mookie Betts, Max Muncy and several members of their pitching staff. Now Ohtani? The manager said he’s “encouraged.”
“I’m not there. I’m expecting him to be there,” Roberts said as image testing awaits Ohtani on Sunday. “I’m expecting him to be in the lineup. … Obviously, I can’t speculate because we don’t get the scans yet. But after the range of motion, the strength test, I felt much better about it.”
What’s amazing about the Dodgers is how they’ve dominated the Yankees with Ohtani as a supporting actor. Yamamoto keeps making his $325 million, becoming only the 13th hurler to allow one or fewer hits in an outing of at least six innings. “I was really looking forward to this game,” he said, “and I'm glad that we had a great ending.”
They are the 57th team to take a 2-0 Series lead. Forty-five have won titles. The Yankees are spooked, with manager Aaron Boone saying, “No one said it’s going to be easy. It’s a long series, and we need to make it a long series now. We won’t flinch.”
Even as Aaron Judge chokes during another poor October. He has struck out 19 times in 40 postseason at-bats, including 13 in the last five games. This was supposed to be an Ohtani-Judge squareoff. Will we see neither?
“That was tough. You never like seeing the best player in the game get injured like that,” Judge said. “Trying to steal a base like that there, and something like that happens. But hopefully it’s good news. We’ll see what happens.”
Wait. What about Judge on Judge? “It's the postseason. Guys are going to make their pitches. They're going to pitch you tough, so I just got to hunker down and get the job done,” he said. “That's what it comes down to and I'm not doing that right now.”
The enormity of the previous evening won’t be forgotten. Freeman’s walk-off Grand Slam, the first ever in the Series, was capsulized by play-by-play man Joe Davis. He’s only 36. He grew up in Potterville, Mich., south of Lansing, and played football at Beloit College in Wisconsin. Imagine replacing Vin Scully as voice of the Dodgers in 2017. How did Davis suddenly produce Scully’s words from Kirk Gibson’s 1988 home run and apply it, for a swelled national audience, to Freeman’s shot?
“She is gone!” he shouted. “Gibby, meet Freddie!”
Want more? Gibson’s homer happened at 8:38 p.m. California time. Freeman’s slam happened at 8:39 p.m. Seconds. This as Gibson said he had a repeat “premonition” when opening his phone at his upstate Michigan ranch.
And the broadcast ratings? The average was 15.2 million viewers, making Game 1 the most watched Series game in five years. Commissioner Rob Manfred was bubbly. “The ratings were really good. I think that at the end of the game our peak plus two was 17.8 million and the whole game was up over 15,” he said. “Peak plus two is the measure of households. We don’t have numbers from Japan.”
Fifteen? Seventeen? Not nine, like last year?
A glow remained in the ballpark, or a darkness within Boone that was seen hours before in the dugout. A wince inside his squeezed face, which almost looked like a smile, turned into a scowl including gritted teeth. Boone’s expression launched torment that featured one of the greatest Yankees, Derek Jeter, and the team’s longtime voice, Michael Kay. He’d better win the Series. If not, they will ask if he deserves to carry on for his eighth season as manager.
Why did he replace Gerrit Cole in the seventh inning after he allowed only four hits and one run on 88 pitches? Why did he expose his bullpen to a “domino effect,” as Jeter described it? And in the end, why use Nestor Cortes when he hadn’t pitched in 37 days with a left elbow strain? Peculiarly, fans would have preferred left-hander Tim Hill, who was signed in June after he was released by … the Chicago White Sox? Why not use a pitcher who couldn’t hang with a 121-loss team while Ohtani, Betts and Freeman came to the plate? That’s where Boone was Friday night.
“Just liked the matchup,” he said of Cortes. “The reality is he's been throwing the ball really well the last few weeks as he's gotten ready for this. I don’t know if you ever love a matchup against Ohtani. But I felt like Nestor could give us a shot at it.”
Point is, the starter hadn’t pitched in an actual game. After retiring Ohtani on a spectacular catch in the left-field stands by Alex Verdugo and intentionally walking Betts, well, you saw the result. So did baseball history. And we were left to ask about Jeter, who once upon a time was a shortstop for the Yankees when Boone played third base. He used his airwaves as a clobbering wedge, preferring to be managing instead of commenting on Fox Sports. Call it a home-team bias, but in truth, the Hall of Famer was conveying what Yankees fans everywhere wanted to vent. Why did Boone remove Cole and let the Dodgers take shots at a bullpen that didn’t survive?
“Look, I know we talk about this all the time and I don’t want to be one of those guys who says, ‘Back in the day when we played,’ but we were talking about how when we played the Mets in 2000 and Al Leiter pitched Game 6 and threw 140-something pitches.’ Gerrit Cole was dominating this game. He was dominating the game!” Jeter said. “And if you take him out after 88 pitches for I don’t know what reason, it’s a domino effect on not only this game, (but) tomorrow’s game and the rest of the series. I just think when you have someone who’s dealing like Gerrit Cole was dealing, you leave him out there as long as you can.”
Kay marched on. “Cortes hadn’t pitched since Sept. 18. Tim Hill has been lights out for the Yankees,” he said. “That’s the guy you bring in. I don’t care about sim games. I don’t care how (Cortes) looked in the bullpen. That did not seem to be the move to make. When you get a start like you did out of Gerrit Cole, you’ve got to win that game. This is the reason he’s on the team. The Yankees have one, well-rested, and he pitched strong innings. Probably should have gone longer and you lose that game. This one stings.”
Said Cortes: “Once I got in, I had all the confidence in the world. I know (Freeman) was going to be aggressive. I wanted it to be higher for that reason. Just didn’t get it to the spot. Right off the hand it looked okay, but just didn’t get it high enough.”
Said Hill: “Why don’t you ask Boonie? I just pitch, bro.”
The Yankees were askew in Game 1. Soto came up short on a ball down the right-field line in the fifth inning, allowing Kike Hernandez to triple and score. “In the moment, you’re trying to make the play. After the ball goes by you, it feels really bad,” Soto said. “When it doesn’t go your way, it sucks.” He said he should have made a better throw in the eighth, when Gleyber Torres couldn’t handle a one-hopper. Ohtani ran to third base and he scored.
So the Yankees must rally at home in Game 3 against Walker Buehler, who was great in his last New York performance, when he allowed no runs and three hits in four innings against the Mets. “We love Walker in big games. The road won’t faze him,” Roberts said. The Dodgers will use another bullpen mix in Game 4.
But all eyeballs in Los Angeles are on Ohtani and an MRI. “We’ve got a great group of guys in here,” said Betts, “and I believe we can take care of business for sure. I believe in us all.”
“When you have a group like this, they picked me up when I have been down,” Freeman said. “We’ll try to do the same for him.”
He should have stayed at first base. Hopefully, a massive Series isn’t backdoored.
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Jay Mariotti, called “without question the most impacting Chicago sportswriter of the past quarter-century,’’ writes general sports columns for Substack while appearing on some of the 1,678,498 podcasts and shows in production today. He is an accomplished columnist, TV panelist and talk/podcast host. Living in Los Angeles, he gravitated by osmosis to film projects.