{"id":9550,"date":"2025-10-17T11:59:11","date_gmt":"2025-10-17T11:59:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/9550\/"},"modified":"2025-10-17T11:59:11","modified_gmt":"2025-10-17T11:59:11","slug":"shohei-ohtani-could-make-history-in-nlcs-game-4-versus-brewers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/9550\/","title":{"rendered":"Shohei Ohtani could make history in NLCS Game 4 versus Brewers"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Shohei Ohtani<\/a> has done next to nothing in the National League Championship Series<\/a>. The Dodgers could sweep their way into the World Series on Friday, with Ohtani as a footnote in the NLCS story, but baseball\u2019s best player has a flair for the dramatic.<\/p>\n

Bring on the latest Babe Ruth comparison<\/a>!<\/p>\n

Baseball\u2019s contemporary two-way superstar can do something Friday that baseball\u2019s original two-way superstar never did.<\/p>\n

Ruth started three postseason games as a pitcher, never hitting a home run in those games. Ohtani starts his second postseason game as a pitcher Friday, looking for his first postseason home run as a pitcher.<\/p>\n

He could hit a home run and be the winning pitcher Friday, because why not?<\/p>\n

\u201cI feel like Shohei is a superhero character,\u201d Dodgers infielder Miguel Rojas<\/a> said.<\/p>\n

In the division series, Ohtani had one hit in 18 at-bats, with nine strikeouts. After the Dodgers clinched<\/a>, this was catcher Will Smith: \u201cHe didn\u2019t do much this series. I expect next series for him to come out and hit like five homers. That\u2019s just who he is.\u201d<\/p>\n

In this series, Ohtani has two hits in 11 at-bats, with five strikeouts. Over the NLDS and NLCS, he is batting .103 with no home runs, and he has struck out in 48% of his at-bats.<\/p>\n

He has not hit five home runs in this series, as Smith had optimistically anticipated.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m hoping he will tomorrow,\u201d Smith said Thursday.<\/p>\n

\"\" <\/p>\n

If a player has a rough week or two in June and changes up his routine, you might hear about it for a couple of minutes on the pregame show. Ohtani had a rough week or two in October and decided to take batting practice on the field instead of in the indoor cages Wednesday, and it became MAJOR BREAKING INTERNATIONAL NEWS.<\/p>\n

Not just for fans, the ones that have made his jersey baseball\u2019s best seller, and the ones set to flock to the grand opening of a Tokyo pop-up gallery<\/a> Friday, featuring vinyl albums that pay homage to the walk-up songs and anthems of Ohtani and other major league stars.<\/p>\n

Ohtani\u2019s teammates came out to watch that rare outdoor batting practice. The sound guys cranked up an extra dose of Michael Bubl\u00e9. And, because it was Ohtani, he hit a ball off the roof of the right-field pavilion.<\/p>\n

So, no, the Dodgers aren\u2019t worried. And, no, Dodgers manager Dave Roberts<\/a> isn\u2019t about to move Ohtani down in the lineup.<\/p>\n

\u201cObviously, Shohei\u2019s not performing the way he would like or we expect,\u201d Roberts said. \u201cBut I just know how big of a part he is to this thing.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve got a long way to go. But I just like the work he\u2019s putting in. And I\u2019ll bet on him all day long.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Dodgers <\/p>\n

Dodgers star Shohei Ohtani runs the bases on a leadoff triple against the Brewers in the first inning of Game 3 of the NLCS on Thursday.<\/p>\n

(Robert Gauthier \/ Los Angeles Times)<\/p>\n

For Ohtani\u2019s hitting, pitching has been his kryptonite this season. In his 15 starts, including the one in the NLDS, he is batting .207, and he has struck out in 43% of his at-bats.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t necessarily think that the pitching has affected my hitting performance,\u201d Ohtani said Wednesday. \u201cJust on the pitching side, as long as I control what I can control, I feel pretty good about putting up results. On the hitting side, just the stance, the mechanics, that\u2019s something that I do. It\u2019s a constant work in progress.\u201d<\/p>\n

There was some progress Thursday, when Ohtani tripled to lead off the first inning. On the next pitch, Mookie Betts<\/a> doubled him home.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s kind of like the Bulls playing without Michael Jordan sometimes,\u201d Betts told TBS after the game. \u201cSo we get him going and then it\u2019s really going to be hard to beat. You see what happens immediately. As soon as he gets a hit, good things happen. But he\u2019s going to be there.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s going to be there when the time is right. We all trust and believe in Shohei.\u201d<\/p>\n

Before the NLCS, Roberts was blunt about Ohtani\u2019s offensive struggles.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re not gonna win the World Series with that sort of performance,\u201d Roberts said.<\/p>\n

That sort of performance has continued, and the Dodgers are undefeated since then. That makes it easier to believe in Ohtani, and in what he might deliver on Friday.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m expecting nothing short of incredible,\u201d infielder Max Muncy<\/a> said.<\/p>\n

\u201cAll in all, I\u2019m expecting Shohei to pitch a great game, and whatever he does offensively is just kind of icing on the cake at that point. It\u2019s a tough thing to pitch and hit in the same game, especially in a postseason game. He\u2019s going to be fine.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Ruth comparison only goes so far. When he pitched in the postseason, he was primarily a pitcher, twice batting ninth. He made 145 pitches in his first postseason start<\/a>, a 14-inning complete-game victory.<\/p>\n

That is about all we can say Ohtani will not do. The Dodgers are so deep that, Roberts\u2019 fear notwithstanding, they could win the World Series with a slumping Ohtani. They did that last year, in fact.<\/p>\n

However, with one mighty swing, Friday\u2019s storyline could be less about what he did not do and more about what Ruth could not do. Champagne showers are in the forecast.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Shohei Ohtani has done next to nothing in the National League Championship Series. The Dodgers could sweep their…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":9551,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[9253,2135,9255,9252,426,2424,9251,48,52,51,47,50,49,4121,1406,4256,9254,424,422,8843,4470],"class_list":{"0":"post-9550","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-los-angeles","8":"tag-at-bat","9":"tag-baseball","10":"tag-contemporary-two-way-superstar","11":"tag-division-series","12":"tag-dodgers","13":"tag-friday","14":"tag-home-run","15":"tag-la","16":"tag-la-headlines","17":"tag-la-news","18":"tag-los-angeles","19":"tag-los-angeles-headlines","20":"tag-los-angeles-news","21":"tag-nlcs-game","22":"tag-performance","23":"tag-pitcher","24":"tag-postseason-game","25":"tag-roberts","26":"tag-shohei-ohtani","27":"tag-way","28":"tag-world-series"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9550","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=9550"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9550\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/9551"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9550"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9550"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9550"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}