CINCINNATI — As the celebrating Los Angeles Dodgers drenched one another in various carbonated boozes, the team’s most important character was bone dry and most likely quite sober roughly two thousand miles away.
Shohei Ohtani, that baseballing mover of mountains, is injured. A laundry list of ailing body parts — biceps, knee, neck — first kept the two-way dynamo from pitching, then frayed his offensive impact and finally rendered him physically incapable of taking the field. Last week, the Dodgers placed him on the IL, with just a few weeks left for him to recover before the start of the postseason and only five games between his earliest eligible return date and the end of the regular season.
Publicly, the club has maintained an optimistic tone, describing his issues as manageable, not season-ending. A return before the end of the regular season is still in play, skipper Dave Roberts reaffirmed this week. Yet nobody around the game would be shocked if the Dodgers opt for caution and keep Ohtani sidelined until October. Los Angeles’ worst-case scenario, of course, would be a postseason without its main man.
So when the Dodgers embarked on their recent two-city swing, their $700 million slugger stayed back in Southern California. He rested, received treatment and hit off a tee — or, as Roberts vaguely put it, “continued his progression.”
“Overall, [his] body feels normal-ish,” Roberts said before Thursday’s clincher. “Then it’s kind of getting his body, his knee, his arm, biceps, whatever, back to full strength.”
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This marked the first time in the Dodgers’ Ohtani Era that the man himself did not accompany the team for the entirety of a road trip. In fact, the most recent occurrence of a Dodgers club flying home without Ohtani came in October 2023, after the team’s sweep loss to the Diamondbacks in that year’s NLDS. Lance Lynn, Austin Barnes and a decade of frustration were on board that plane. Ohtani was still technically an Angel. In other words, it’s been a while.
With the two-way superstar now the center of the Dodgers’ solar system — and, to a large extent, the league’s extended universe — Ohtani’s absence this week in Cincinnati was easy to sense, impossible to avoid. Throughout the week, all about the yard, were reminders both big and small.
The blue bat bags lined up outside the locker room in numerical order went right from Will Smith’s No. 16 to Kyle Tucker’s No. 23, with no No. 17 to be found. Dodgers head security guard Al Garcia, typically within eyesight of Ohtani at all times, floated around the clubhouse with an uncharacteristically laid-back comportment buoyed by his relatively light list of duties.
A group of passionate Dodgers fans recognized the star’s absence with a homemade sign that read “Feel Better Shohei, Give Decoy A Hug,” making reference to Ohtani’s dog. Even Yoshinobu Yamamoto admitted that it was odd not having Ohtani around, delivering one of his funnier and more cutting lines of the season.
“It’s been a weird feeling because I talk to him all the time in the clubhouse,” Yamamoto said via interpreter Yoshihiro Sonoda. “Although I have Roki [Sasaki], he doesn’t really talk to me.”
The Dodgers’ lineup missed Ohtani, too, averaging less than four runs per game on the road trip before Thursday’s eight-run outburst against a bottom-five Cincinnati pitching staff. Utility man Tommy Edman got the bulk of leadoff duties, with Mookie Betts and rookie call-up Josue De Paula getting a day each in the one-hole. Edman went just 1-for-23 on the trip. Freddie Freeman’s power dip continued, with five singles and nothing else. Will Smith has yet to really pop off since his return from the IL on Sept. 1.
“It feels different because he’s such a presence when he’s on the field,” Roberts admitted Monday.
Therein lies the lingering concern. The Dodgers and Ohtani have all but accepted that he won’t pitch again this season. That’s not the end of the world; Los Angeles has the arms to solve that problem. On the other hand, navigating October without Ohtani at full-go would be a difficult proposition.
Ohtani’s health, too, is not binary. Even if he plays, which at this point feels likely, he’s unlikely to be completely healed. That dynamic could very well hamper his performance. Ohtani, overly cautious as they come, revealed that concern the last time he spoke to reporters on Sept. 8.
“I should have enough experience to address any kinks or injuries or anything like that with the swing,” Ohtani said. “I’m going to use this as an opportunity to add on to the experience that I’ve had previously and address it regardless.”
It’s not exactly the most reassuring explanation — Ohtani implying that he’ll need to manage his various discomforts for the rest of the season. How that process transpires and how productive Ohtani proves to be in October could determine how many champagne celebrations he’ll get to participate in this year.
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