knee has been bothering<\/a> him for a month, and prompted the Dodgers to skip his final pitching start of the first half. Ohtani went directly from Dodger Stadium to get his knee drained and likely get a pain-killing injection after Sunday\u2019s game, a planned course of action to maximize the All-Star break.<\/p>\nOhtani said the other ailments he\u2019s had this season, including a blister and some biceps tightness, are normal wear and tear of the season. This issue is different. Ohtani reportedly told Japanese media the discomfort centers on his kneecap. Ohtani had surgery in 2019 to address a bipartite patella that he was born with.<\/p>\n
The hope is that the course of treatment during the All-Star break knocks out the pain entirely. Ohtani will still need to be managed carefully. He has faced 340 batters as a pitcher and made 406 plate appearances as a hitter, giving him 746 times where he\u2019s been directly involved in the game in the first half. In 2023, his last year as a full-time two-way player, he had 1,130 such interactions total.<\/p>\n
What Ohtani is doing on both sides of the ball is remarkable. Making sure he can do it in October is paramount.<\/p>\n
\u201cNothing is gonna come in front of being healthy for October,\u201d Roberts said.<\/p>\n
Will this roster ever be at full strength?<\/p>\n
Throughout the first half, several observers around the Dodgers noted how they\u2019ve found success despite who they\u2019ve been missing. Blake Snell has made just one start. Edwin D\u00edaz has appeared in just seven games. Kyle Tucker has an OPS that starts with a 7. They only just got Tommy Edman back, and they lost Kik\u00e9 Hern\u00e1ndez almost as soon as he returned from offseason surgery. The Dodgers have gone from Will Smith not needing a stint on the injured list to him being out for more than a month with a neck issue, just as they thought Tyler Glasnow wouldn\u2019t need to go on the IL in early May and he hasn\u2019t pitched since.<\/p>\n
The Dodgers have not seen a fully formed version of their roster this season. Will they?<\/p>\n
D\u00edaz did indeed appear in a game on Saturday night \u2026 in Ontario, with the Dodgers\u2019 Class A affiliate. This was the start of his rehab assignment after undergoing surgery to clean out bone chips from his elbow. He could be back sooner rather than later.<\/p>\n
Snell will start a rehab assignment next week and could be back within four or five starts after a procedure for bone spurs in his elbow.<\/p>\n
Hern\u00e1ndez will start a rehab assignment after the All-Star break and could be active by the time they next play at Dodger Stadium on July 28.<\/p>\n
Glasnow is progressing slowly, but did throw a bullpen session last weekend. He is hoping to clear each step without his back flaring up.<\/p>\n
Then there\u2019s Smith, who has been swinging, but his recovery is stagnant.<\/p>\n
\u201cCertainly expect him back this year,\u201d Roberts said of Smith. \u201cJust have no idea when.\u201d<\/p>\n
So \u2026 what do the Dodgers need at the deadline?<\/p>\n
The Dodgers wrapped up the season\u2019s first half with a .777 OPS, tops in baseball. While Roberts griped that the bats could be more consistent in the second half, there isn\u2019t an obvious place for the Dodgers to seek out more offense.<\/p>\n
Their October rotation of Yoshinobu Yamamoto, Ohtani, Snell and Glasnow still projects to be one of the game\u2019s best, and that alignment would essentially push Justin Wrobleski, Roki Sasaki, Emmet Sheehan and others (potentially River Ryan) into relief roles, boosting the Dodgers\u2019 bullpen.<\/p>\n
The Dodgers could seek to add impact for impact\u2019s sake with Tarik Skubal, but there isn\u2019t another obvious candidate out there on the market. They could canvass the margins, like when they acquired Brock Stewart, Alex Call and prospects James Tibbs III and Zach Ehrhard as part of a 2025 deadline haul in which the only prospects they surrendered all period were Hunter Feduccia, Sean Paul Linan and Eriq Swan.<\/p>\n
They might be more intriguing in the market for what they could give up in a trade. The Dodgers have a potential surplus of starting pitching and have already traded a big-league starter at each of the last three deadlines (Noah Syndergaard in 2023, James Paxton in 2024 and Dustin May in 2025).<\/p>\n
The Dodgers also have a farm system loaded with outfielders who could be used to reconfigure their group of prospects. They could be an interesting team at the deadline, just not in the way you\u2019d think.<\/p>\n
Can their stars perform like stars?<\/p>\n
Ohtani has a .952 OPS and a 1.79 ERA on the mound, so you can check him off. Freddie Freeman and Max Muncy put up All-Star first halves. Andy Pages was the Dodgers\u2019 best player for stretches of April and May, making him a first-time All-Star even as his bat has fallen off. Mookie Betts was starting to figure it out, but he still has a 93 wRC+.<\/p>\n
Tucker is supposed to be the guy to change things for the Dodgers. He, Pages and Dalton Rushing are the only regulars on the active roster under 30. Tucker is also the only player of that group receiving a record average annual value after signing a four-year, $240 million deal this winter.<\/p>\n
Tucker hasn\u2019t been an active detriment to the roster. He\u2019s produced at around a league-average rate. His defense has been fine. But he has been neither the floor-raiser the Dodgers signed nor the budding superstar he was for much of his time with the Houston Astros and in the first half of 2025 with the Chicago Cubs. Tucker felt as if he finished the first half in a good place.<\/p>\n
\u201cControlled the strike zone a lot better, barreled up a lot more balls,\u201d Tucker said. \u201cJust need them to fall a little bit more.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Dodgers don\u2019t necessarily need him to play like a superstar until October. But they\u2019re expecting more than what they\u2019ve gotten so far.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"LOS ANGELES \u2014\u00a0Regular-season success feels like a given around these parts because the Los Angeles Dodgers have created…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":764921,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[65],"tags":[2323,363,99],"class_list":["post-764920","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mlb","tag-los-angeles-dodgers","tag-mlb","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/764920","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=764920"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/764920\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/764921"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=764920"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=764920"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=764920"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}