#MLBVideos: Shohei Ohtani’s Full Birthday Start! 🎉

Shohei Ohtani’s Full Birthday Start! 🎉

Otani and the Dodgers have won 18 of their last 24 games. Major League best 56 and 33. Astros 27 and 10 since late May. The best record in baseball in that stretch. And look out right away. Heach Paradis who leads off. Homerred on the first pitch of the game yesterday. This time he takes ball one. He’s a guy along with Walker who pretty much are the two that take the most pitches per at bat for the Astros. This guy here in Paradis has seen more pitches than anybody in baseball the last couple years. Kind of reestablishing the identity that the Astros prided themselves on with all those pennant wins, division wins. Kind of got away from last year, but a guy that embodies that approach up there in Paradis who they got in the Kyle Tucker deal. Leads the team in home runs and in runs batted in. his 18th coming yesterday. And a good take on a pitch away here to get him ahead two and one. Two and two. Well, he just has such an athletic body, right? To say the least. His ability to command the baseball. I’m just telling you, you have no idea how hard this is. We could talk for six innings and I could explain to you how most players would have to go to rehab starts in the minors. Get their innings, get their pitches, get their feel. It’s going to be rough. Hooked into left field. Kika Hernandez comes on, plays it on a bounce and a leadoff hit for Parades. Typically what happens and you because he’s doing it such a short time frame, the one thing I’ve noticed, he’s not trying to do everything in two innings. You know, the tendency for me, if I was in this situation, I’d want every pitch working. I’d probably over pitch and overthrow situations that don’t make sense. He seems to have a calm heartbeat. He knows what he wants to accomplish. Even though it’s two innings at the big league level, it’s like getting a tease. And you don’t want that to get amped up the wrong way. Speaking of a calm heartbeat, how about this kid here, Cam Smith, who got drafted less than a year ago by the Chicago Cubs and was a key piece in that Kyle Tucker deal. Made the opening day roster. That was headline news. And he’s just charged his way up that lineup, hitting .395 over his last 20 games. Yeah, when you think about the Houston Astros and their ability to hit the fast ball, they do it very well. Now, this is an elite fast ball. 96 mph. But the Astros as a team do a great job against fast balls.
Broken bat bouncer up the middle for Tommy Edmonds. Steps on the bag over the for two. Just to give you an insight right here how good this pitch is. as he cracks the bat. He goes up the middle and is able to because he can’t get out of the box that quick as a righthander able to turn the two uh [Applause] think I think you can know who’s at the plate right now.
Yeah, could save my breath. Fans telling you the lone remaining position player from the 2017 controversial championship club. It’s Jose Altuve who responded to those booze by going three for three with a pair of home runs yesterday. And we were talking with Joe Espatada before the game. He said it’s just the latest example of this guy saying this is my team. Like he so often steps up and does rolls over to short and finishes off a 10 pitch first inning for Otani. He said that when he turned 31 he would have his first daughter. He missed that by like two months and he wrote this script 15 years ago. upstairs with the first pitch to Christian Walker. Talk about manifesting things. Now, Walker, this is own personal playground here at Dodger Stadium. Another home run yesterday. He’s the first player in Dodger Stadium history to home run in six consecutive games. Did it with the Arizona Diamondbacks. Dodgers are thinking, “Thank God he’s no longer in the division.” Signs with the Astros. goes up here and picks up right where he left off with Arizona on a 200 from Otani. He takes ball three.
Well, it might be just what the Astros needed because you whenever you come to a new club and high expectations, contract and all that, you get off to a really slow start and this last week might be an encouraging sign for the Astros and Walker finds the zone and it’s three and one. Show in his fifth season as a two-way player fires a 3-1 pitch gets a fast ball by him. Last three years that he was a full-time two-way guy 2021 through 2023. Only Aaron Judge had a better OPS at the plate and only two starting pitchers had a better erra on the mount than 284. He doesn’t just do both, he stars at both. Here’s his payoff. A lot of people thought I was crazy a couple years ago making a comment to just kind of give the ultimate compliment I can knowing it would never happen. If it all he did was pitch and didn’t hit, he’d be the best pitcher in baseball. And people looked at me like I might have lost my mind. But the reality is we’re never going to see it. So it can’t be proved. But my point is he’s so talented on the mound, we’re only getting a glimpse of what he can do because he’s so good at the plate. And so his ability, whether it’s three 0, come back and get a strike out, he would be the best pitcher on the Dodgers if he was healthy for the postseason because of
because of his heartbeat, because of his athleticism. I’m just telling you, we haven’t seen the full greatness until these next couple years if he stays healthy. the discipline, the restraint, and you see it in so many different ways. You see it with the way he handles his day. How about budgeting two schedules, his schedule to train as a hitter, his schedule to train as a pitcher, both full-time jobs. And that’s my point, like when Jacob Deg Grom was on top of his game. Yeah, he had to hit a little bit because they still hit in the National League, but he was training to pitch and he pitched at the highest level. This guy is training to do multiple things, multiple information, bullpen, hitting, all the things that you have to do to survive just as a position player. And then couple that with the um routine that most people don’t know a pitcher goes through cuz they think, “Ah, how hard is that? Once every 5 days.” It’s harder than people think. And he’s doing it in a rehab form coming back. Well, we know about the athleticism and you see how explosive and graceful he is as an athlete, but one of his biggest superpowers is his intentionality and his thoughtfulness with his schedule and how diligent he is down to the minute each day to be able to make both these things happen. Two careers at once. Yeah. You got to take care of yourself. You have to be disciplined and you’ve got to be a freak because at some point something’s got to give. And and if I had, you know, it’s not fair to put timets on anything, but in the next three years, oh no,
anything more than that in a two-way for the Dodgers would be unbelievable. In other words, the next three years, I think he can keep this up. But then after that, at some point, something’s going to give. And I think the Dodgers are going to be pretty fine if he can get those next three years of two-way playing.
Oh, no.
Teratini checks his swing and the count goes full. So that would put him halfway through the 10-year deal. He’s already gotten him the one championship.
Exactly. And and I don’t I just don’t think people understand how taxing and how hard it is to come back from an injury, but to do what he’s doing. Backto back strikeouts. A video game pitch right there to get Keratini. [Applause] I mean, he just
again is in the right place at the right time mechanically. Throws all the pitches that you want for all the alleys to give a hitter a nightmare. And it doesn’t look like it just looks effortless. And that’s to me to me
if he can stay away from 100 mph fast balls then I think he’s got a longer shelf life. So, you don’t like seeing like we saw last week 101.7 fastest pitch of his career?
It’s okay when you know you’re only going an inning or two.
I just don’t think it’s long-term five, six innings. Diaz down the line foul cuz you know the reality of how many times will he pitch five innings this year? It may not been a might be a couple, but that’s taking into effect the Dodgers get all their guys healthy that they’ve all assembled in their rotation and then what do you got? I mean, you just he’s got pretty pretty incredible choices that Dave Roberts will have down the stretch.
He told us today Tyler Glassnau is going to make his return off of the injured list Wednesday in Milwaukee. Blake Snell through today making progress towards his return. They’re still waiting on Roi Sasaki to come back as well. Fast ball’s fouled off and it’s one and two and Otani’s got a chance to strike out the side. I mean, a couple of these guys are going to have to go to the pen. You don’t have you can’t when it comes to the postseason if everybody’s healthy a couple of these guys are going to be in the pen. That’s hard to believe. You could imagine Otanian short burst. He doesn’t get fully built up like the rest of the starters. Here’s his one two to Diaz and it’s chopped foul. [Applause] Well, the Dodgers are doing it with a formula that we thought in the beginning of the year would be the formula that the Astros are doing it. meaning they’re dominating pitching. It’s the opposite for the Dodgers. They’re doing it with their offense. Their pitching is way down. Their innings in the bullpen number one by a lot. That’s got to change. Their injuries and the reason why their pitching is not where we thought it would be because this is a when everyone’s healthy, it’s probably the best pitching staff I’ve ever seen for stuff. Pure stuff. They’ve had to use 16 different starters. Yeah. And then like you talked about the trickle down on that with the shorter starts you’re getting as the bullpen load being up there in terms of innings pitch. They’ve been able to disperse that across many arms in the bullpen. Still something they’d like to smooth out as this year continues. Another one two to Diaz. He got him swinging and he strikes out the side. Happy birthday Shi Otani.

Shohei Ohtani took the mound for the Los Angeles Dodgers on his 31st birthday and collects 3 strikeouts in a game against the Houston Astros.

Don’t forget to subscribe! https://www.youtube.com/mlb

Follow us elsewhere too:
Twitter: https://twitter.com/MLB
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mlb/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/mlb
TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@mlb

Check out MLB.com daily to watch the MLB.TV Free Game of the Day! https://mlb.com/freegame

Visit our site for all baseball news, stats and scores! https://www.mlb.com/