LOS ANGELES — Making his return to a major-league mound for the first time since starting Game 7 of the 2025 World Series, Shohei Ohtani kicked off his first full season as a two-way player for the Los Angeles Dodgers Tuesday night with six innings of one-hit ball against the Cleveland Guardians.
Ohtani did not feel his sharpest, but the outing still served as the type of season debut one would expect from baseball’s most esteemed player, who has not pitched a full season since 2023 and has not been shy about his desires to re-establish himself as one of the sport’s premier pitchers.
Given Ohtani’s pure talent and ability, there’s hardly any doubt that won’t be a reality. The primary concern coming into this year is Ohtani’s health. After finishing last season with 18 total appearances (including four in the postseason) Ohtani has maintained that he feels strong and is ready to return to the mound full-time after undergoing his second notable elbow surgery at the end of the 2023 season.
“Last year I felt good,” Ohtani said through interpreter Will Ireton after Tuesday’s 4-1 win. “But this year I do feel a lot more loose and easy pitching overall. Looking back at today’s outing specifically, that wasn’t necessarily the case. So that’s something I want to work on. But compared to last season I felt more loose and easy.”
The Dodgers would certainly prefer to keep it that way. Between Ohtani and Yoshinobu Yamamoto, Los Angeles could boast two pitchers in the National League Cy Young conversation this year. What will differ between the two is the usage. Citing a desire to keep him healthy throughout the season, the Dodgers are taking a conservative approach with Ohtani to start the season. He’ll be used as a traditional starter, but he won’t be on traditional rest, and he likely won’t make 30-plus starts this year.
In a perfect world — at least for the near future — Ohtani will go six days between starts, ensuring an extra rest day over a traditional starter’s five-day turn through the rotation. That should be relatively easy for the Dodgers to navigate in April, due to a favorable schedule to start the season. Los Angeles has each of the next three Thursdays off, and four of their next five. That means they’ll be able to grant Ohtani an extra rest day while keeping the rotation on turn — something Roberts plans to do at least through the first half of the team’s upcoming road trip to Washington and Toronto.
Roberts will re-evaluate potential innings limits and when to build in extra rest for Ohtani after each of his starts.
“I’m going start by start,” Roberts said earlier in the week. “It’s just not an exact science, as much as people want to think it might be, and some people probably do. Innings aren’t all created equal. All throws aren’t created equal. We talked to him a lot on how he’s feeling, and if there’s days that we got to kind of give him a couple extra days, we’re willing to do that.”
Shohei Ohtani ends his night on the mound with a 6th strikeout! pic.twitter.com/pSNl1J9B2n
— MLB (@MLB) April 1, 2026
Using Justin Wrobleski as a hybrid sixth starter gives the Dodgers additional flexibility. The team did not use Wrobleski in the first series of the season, electing to hold him for length behind Roki Sasaki should the young starter struggle like he did in spring. Sasaki looked better in his season debut — he allowed an earned run on two walks and four hits over four-plus innings Monday against the Guardians — but the Dodgers will likely want to keep Wrobleski in tandem with Sasaki at least one more turn through the rotation, or at until Sasaki can establish more consistency.
If Wrobleski is not needed in the piggyback role, that should free him up to take a spot start or two. Roberts has reiterated this possibility several times dating back to spring training. The spot starts will likely come when the Dodgers would like to buy an additional day of recovery for the rest of their rotation.
Regardless, it would not be unusual for Ohtani to see between six and seven days between starts through April. In fact, in the Dodgers’ eyes, it’d be ideal.
Given Ohtani’s pedigree, it’d be understandable to speculate that performances like Tuesday’s could change the Dodgers’ perspective. If Ohtani dominates through his next few starts, would the Dodgers revert back to traditional rest? Probably not, Roberts said, at least not this early.
“I think that, appreciating the fact it’s a long season, and the schedule that he’s been on his time pitching, just being mindful to give ample recovery,” Roberts said. “And he’s also an everyday player, so I think that’s important. I think it’s always good to hear that he feels strong enough to pitch more frequently, which is great. And at some point we might do that. I don’t know when. But I think that status quo right now is pretty good.”
Dating back to last regular season, Shohei Ohtani has thrown 22.2 consecutive scoreless innings — a new career high! pic.twitter.com/egPFovdNPM
— MLB (@MLB) April 1, 2026
Ohtani too is mindful about his usage, and understands the Dodgers’ conservative approach. He has thrown over 160 innings just once in his MLB career, when he made 28 starts for the Los Angeles Angels in 2022.
“2022 did feel like the workload, the intensity was very high up there,” he said. “So just being able to know that going into this season is going to be helpful.”
“I believe the team should be prioritizing Yoshinobu, (Tyler) Glasnow and (Blake) Snell when he’s back,” Ohtani added. “So I think it’s easy to kind of fit me in to that schedule whenever the team feels that’s a good thing. What’s most important is that we’re all healthy in October. So whatever the team wants ultimately that’s when I’m going to start and pitch.”
Yamamoto will start Wednesday’s series finale against Cleveland before an off day Thursday. Roberts has not finalized Ohtani’s next start, but should the Dodgers stay on turn, it would line up to be Monday in Toronto — a rematch of last year’s Game 7.
Ohtani finished Tuesday night 1-for-3 with two walks and a single, by far his best night at the plate in what has been a slow start to the year offensively. Combine that with his six scoreless frames and it’s easy to fantasize about what Ohtani could accomplish this season.
But the Dodgers are just happy to have their two-way star doing two-way things, at long last. They’ll take Ohtani in any capacity, even if it will be somewhat limited to start.