Shohei Ohtani hopes his second career start at San Francisco’s Oracle Park is a longer version of his first when the Los Angeles Dodgers seek to even their three-game series against the Giants on Wednesday night.
Landen Roupp outdueled Yoshinobu Yamamoto in a 3-1 Giants win in the series opener on Tuesday, a game in which San Francisco used six pitchers to limit the two-time defending World Series champions to one run and three hits.
While the focus was on the starting pitchers — as it will be again in the rematch — Giants manager Tony Vitello cited the four-inning role of relievers Ryan Borucki, Matt Gage, Erik Miller, Keaton Winn and Ryan Walker as being critical to Tuesday’s success in particular and a 7-5 response to a 3-8 start in general this season.
“The unit’s done great for us,” Vitello told reporters after the win. “Tonight is just a little bit of the epitome of it.
“I’m a big believer there’s a bit of a dance going on in a game and everything is connected. The starters have helped the relievers, and the relievers have helped the starters.”
Tyler Mahle (0-3, 7.23 ERA) has needed a lot of help in the first four games of his Giants career, failing to reach the sixth inning three times. The right-hander was bombed for eight runs on eight hits in four innings in his most recent start, an 8-3 loss at Cincinnati last Wednesday.
Mahle has gone 2-3 with a 3.72 ERA in seven career starts against the Dodgers.
Ohtani (2-0, 0.50) will be facing Giants hitters as a starter for just the fourth time in his career. He’s gone 1-0 with a 0.60 ERA in his three head-to-heads, two of which have been at home.
The only previous time he pitched at San Francisco came in his fifth start last season, when he worked three shutout innings in a 2-1 win. He struck out four and limited the hosts to one hit.
Ohtani has allowed a total of just seven hits and two runs (one earned) in his 18 innings this season, going six in each of his three starts. He has struck out 18 in those 18 innings.
The two-way threat has yet to help his cause offensively on nights he’s pitched this season. He went 1-for-6 with three walks and three strikeouts in his first two starts against Cleveland and Toronto before being held out of the batting order in his last outing against the New York Mets on April 15.
Dodgers manager Dave Roberts says Ohtani will help decide when he bats and when he doesn’t moving forward.
“It makes a lot of sense that if you’re … hitting while pitching, it takes a little bit of a toll,” Roberts said to reporters. “He certainly has managed it really well. But if it makes sense, I’ll have that conversation with him.”
Ohtani went just 1-for-4 with two strikeouts in Tuesday’s loss, but the hit — an infield single in his final plate appearance — allowed him to continue a historic run. He reached base for the 53rd straight game in which he’s batted bridging the 2025 and 2026 seasons, tying Shawn Green in 2000 for the second-longest streak by a Dodger in the Modern Era.
Duke Snider set the Modern Day franchise record of 58 in 1954 with the Brooklyn Dodgers.
–Field Level Media
