{"id":159085,"date":"2026-02-01T12:21:08","date_gmt":"2026-02-01T12:21:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/159085\/"},"modified":"2026-02-01T12:21:08","modified_gmt":"2026-02-01T12:21:08","slug":"dodgers-reveal-full-plans-for-shohei-ohtani-at-wbc-for-japan","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/159085\/","title":{"rendered":"Dodgers reveal full plans for Shohei Ohtani at WBC for Japan"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.sportingnews.com\/us\/mlb\/shohei-ohtani\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Shohei Ohtani<\/a> closed out the 2023 World Baseball Classic on the mound.<\/p>\n<p>It was a classic scene. He struck out his Angels teammate Mike Trout in the championship game, getting the save for Samurai Japan over the United States.<\/p>\n<p>That won&#8217;t be possible in the 2026 WBC, though.<\/p>\n<p>Ohtani will only be hitting for Japan, not pitching.<\/p>\n<p>MORE:\u00a0<a target=\"\" href=\"https:\/\/www.sportingnews.com\/us\/mlb\/cleveland-guardians\/news\/how-guardians-jose-ramirez-pace-cleveland-derek-jeter\/4f853a182bc8cfe42b7f0aa7\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">How Jose Ramirez is on pace to become Cleveland&#8217;s Derek Jeter<\/a><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.sportingnews.com\/us\/mlb\/los-angeles-dodgers\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Los Angeles Dodgers<\/a> manager <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/FabianArdaya\/status\/2017751871365247122\" rel=\"nofollow\">Dave Roberts revealed<\/a> that news in a conversation with reporters on Saturday.<\/p>\n<p>Roberts also shared that Ohtani will be ready to pitch for the Dodgers as soon as the regular season gets underway.<\/p>\n<p>That makes it clear that this is a cautionary decision, not a specifically health-related one.<\/p>\n<p>Given the overall importance of Ohtani as a two-way superstar to the Dodgers, it makes sense that they&#8217;d want to limit how much usage his arm gets.<\/p>\n<p>MORE:\u00a0<a target=\"\" href=\"https:\/\/www.sportingnews.com\/us\/mlb\/pittsburgh-pirates\/news\/pirates-paul-skenes-new-pitch\/56962ae35deb32c3355b5bc1\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Paul Skenes has added a new pitch<\/a><\/p>\n<p>They want him for the World Series as they try to three-peat. If he pitches at too high an intensity in March, that could create worries as the season goes along.<\/p>\n<p>This way, Japan gets one of the best hitters on the planet in its lineup, and the Dodgers ensure that Ohtani&#8217;s crucial right arm is healthy when Opening Day arrives.<\/p>\n<p>It&#8217;s a compromise, to be sure. Both sides will be OK with it, though, because they get Ohtani on their team.<\/p>\n<p>More MLB news:<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Shohei Ohtani closed out the 2023 World Baseball Classic on the mound. It was a classic scene. He&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":159086,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[36],"tags":[163,165,164],"class_list":["post-159085","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-anaheim","tag-anaheim","tag-anaheim-headlines","tag-anaheim-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/159085","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=159085"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/159085\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/159086"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=159085"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=159085"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=159085"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}