LOS ANGELES — Shohei Ohtani stuck to pitching and did his part, delivering another six-inning start with minimal damage. But the Dodgers couldn’t find much offense to support him in their 2-1 loss to the Miami Marlins on Tuesday night at Dodger Stadium.
Ohtani was pitching on five days rest with any sort of length for the first time since 2023, when 15 of his 23 starts that season with the Angels were on five days rest. Don’t expect that many such starts this year, however.
“I think it could happen, he’s certainly open to it. But in this particular situation, given what Tyler [Glasnow] did and kind of how it played out — but it could flip the next time,” manager Dave Roberts said before Tuesday’s game. “I’m not going to say it’s the last time [pitching on five days rest], but I don’t think it’s going to be commonplace.”
All told, it was an impressive start for Ohtani with nine strikeouts, though he also tied his season high with three walks in his six innings. He did allow all of two runs, one of which was earned, matching his totals from his first four starts combined. Ohtani’s 104 pitches were his most in a start with the Dodgers, four more than Game 4 of last year’s National League Championship Series.
Ohtani’s ERA ballooned, all the way to 0.60, which once again leads the National League, another one-day stop atop the leaderboard as he has exactly 30 innings through 30 team games through Tuesday night. Ohtani has lead the NL in ERA after all five of his starts.
Lowest Dodgers ERA through April
Fernando Valenzuela (1981) 0.20
Fernando Valenzuela (1984) 0.21
Shohei Ohtani (2026) 0.60
*in live-ball era (since 1920), minimum 5 starts, per Baseball Reference
Three errant throws produced the first Marlins run against Ohtani, in the second inning. He hit Augustín Ramírez with a pitch, then had Ramírez dead to rights on a stolen base attempt but threw the ball into center field, putting the Marlins catcher on third base with nobody out. After a strikeout, Ramírez tagged on a flyout to Andy Pages, whose throw was up the third base line and hit Ramírez as he scored.
That first run was unearned, but Ohtani allowed an earned run in the fifth, a frame in which he allowed two walks and two singles. It could have been worse, with the bases full of Marlins with two outs, but Ohtani struck out Ramírez to extinguish that threat.
Any signs of fatigue were allayed when Ohtani worked around a single with three more strikeouts in the sixth, giving him nine on the night.
On a normal night, the Dodgers probably win this kind of a start over two-thirds of the time (they are 12-5, with a .706 winning percentage when a pitcher goes at least six innings and allows no more than two runs this season). But on Tuesday, the offense failed to score in six innings against Janson Junk, who allowed only three singles and a walk.
Los Angeles did not score until three singles with one out in the eighth inning, with Will Smith driving in Dalton Rushing to pull within one.
Andy Pages reached on an infield single with one out in the ninth, but was stranded by Tyler Phillips, who surrendered the game-winning hit the night before.
The Dodgers are trying to find avenues, whenever possible, to give Ohtani extra rest, which is why he didn’t also serve as designated hitter against the Marlins. Picking their spots for such rest will depend on how Ohtani is feeling.
“I think his goal is to his goal is to make every [pitching] start. So with that, there has to be some compromise and some openness to read and react,” Roberts said. “I think so far we’re doing a nice job, and he’s open to that.”
Tuesday was the 12th of 13 consecutive game days for the Dodgers, and Ohtani was the only position player to start all of the previous 11 games.
“The 13 in a row, I think it’s been a grind on everyone. And also taking into consideration everything that Shohei goes through on a daily basis, to know that he’ll be back in the lineup tomorrow,” Roberts said. “I think this is an opportunity to hedge a little bit, play both sides, so have a guy who’s swinging a good bat in Dalton to replace him for a night, to give Shohei the best opportunity to pitch well and not take on both duties, then just hit tomorrow and have an off day. Hopefully this abbreviation will give him a reset, after the off day.”
Maybe Ohtani’s bat will help the Dodgers find some offense in the series finale.
Tuesday particulars
Home runs: none
WP — Janson Junk (2-2): 6 IP, 3 hits, 1 walk, 4 strikeouts
LP — Shohei Ohtani (2-1): 6 IP, 4 hits, 2 runs, 3 walks, 9 strikeouts
Sv — Tyler Phillips (2): 1 IP, 1 hit
Up next
One more day left on the homestand, with Tyler Glasnow going for the series win on Wednesday afternoon (12:10 p.m., SportsNet LA), against Marlins ace Sandy Alcantara.