{"id":931688,"date":"2026-10-13T17:02:08","date_gmt":"2026-10-13T17:02:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/931688\/"},"modified":"2026-10-13T17:02:08","modified_gmt":"2026-10-13T17:02:08","slug":"report-dodgers-considering-benching-shohei-ohtani-for-game-3-of-nlcs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/931688\/","title":{"rendered":"Report: Dodgers considering benching Shohei Ohtani for Game 3 of NLCS"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The defending World Series champions are considering benching struggling superstar <a data-player=\"80de60c9-74e3-4a50-b128-b3dc7456a254\" href=\"https:\/\/www.sportsnet.ca\/baseball\/mlb\/players\/shohei-ohtani\/80de60c9-74e3-4a50-b128-b3dc7456a254\" target=\"_self\" class=\"sn-player-post-link\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Shohei Ohtani<\/a> after going down 2-0 in the National League Championship Series to the Milwaukee Brewers, Katie Woo and Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/athletic\/7685422\/2026\/10\/12\/shohei-ohtani-playing-benching-dodgers-brewers-mlb-playoffs\/?unlocked_article_code=1.IVE.fWkz.cZ6kfZV0jwtA&amp;source=emp_shared_article&amp;smid=ta-ios-share\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">reported<\/a> on Monday.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cYeah, I mean obviously it hasn\u2019t been good,\u201d Dodgers manager Dave Roberts told The Athletic. \u201cHe doesn\u2019t feel great. I think for me, it\u2019s having a conversation with him tomorrow, kind of try to figure out what\u2019s best for him, what\u2019s best for us. He certainly has earned that conversation and deserves it.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI\u2019ll have (that conversation) with him tomorrow.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Benching Ohtani requires more than a conversation between player and manager, with Dodgers president of baseball operations Andrew Friedman also being included in the decision, among others, Woo and Rosenthal added. <\/p>\n<p>Ohtani&#8217;s OPS this post-season dipped to .411 after a 0-for-4 showing with two strikeouts against the Brewers on Monday. The 32-year-old similarly struggled after returning from a two-week absence due to right bicep discomfort in late September. <\/p>\n<p>The two-way slugger has also been hampered by a knee injury this season, last pitching on July 3 and being shut down from throwing on Sept. 7. <\/p>\n<p>Ohtani&#8217;s cold streak down the stretch led him to finish with 30 home runs and an .889 OPS, well below his averages of 51 long balls and a 1.037 OPS over the previous three seasons. He hit his last home run on Aug. 18.<\/p>\n<p>A winner of three consecutive league MVP awards and four total, Ohtani was dropped to fifth in the Dodgers lineup for Game 3 of the NLDS, his lowest position in a lineup since his 2020 season with the Los Angeles Angels. <\/p>\n<p>If the Dodgers sit Ohtani, rookie <a href=\"https:\/\/www.sportsnet.ca\/baseball\/mlb\/players\/josue-de-paula\/c4d1213a-010b-4a9e-b79b-9db67a665023\" class=\"sn-player-post-link\" target=\"_self\" data-player=\"c4d1213a-010b-4a9e-b79b-9db67a665023\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Josue De Paula<\/a> would be the top candidate to fill his role as designated hitter in the starting lineup, according to Woo and Rosenthal. <\/p>\n<p>De Paula, still ranked as the Dodgers&#8217; No. 1 prospect after being called up in September and stepping to the plate just 42 times, has been successful so far in MLB.<\/p>\n<p>The 21-year-old outfielder has a 1.081 OPS, one home run and seven RBIs over that stretch, and has walked twice in three post-season plate appearances. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The defending World Series champions are considering benching struggling superstar Shohei Ohtani after going down 2-0 in the&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":931689,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[49,48,82],"class_list":["post-931688","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/931688","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=931688"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/931688\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/931689"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=931688"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=931688"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=931688"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}