It couldn’t have been scripted any better.
The Dodgers, a team that had the most exorbitant offseason of any team in baseball history, began the season 8-0 and came into Independence Day weekend with a nine game lead over the San Diego Padres. Since then, the Dodgers not only whiffed at the deadline (unlike San Diego), but have managed to post a horrible 12-21 record since July 4 and allow the Padres to overtake them for the division lead.
Now, the two teams will meet for the first time in two months, with the Padres having swept the San Francisco Giants while the Dodgers suffered another sweep at the hands of the Angels. The Padres have already shown their new additions, such as reliever Mason Miller, about their distain and urgency to win over the Dodgers. If the Dodgers want to consider themselves the best in the division, then they’ll need to match the same urgency that San Diego carries, writes Bill Plunkett of the Orange County Register.
“We need to ramp up the intensity. We do,” Roberts said. “Because if we don’t then I just don’t think it’ll bode well for us.”
Shohei Ohtani will not have a controversy-free year in 2025, as he an his agent, Nez Balelo, were sued for $240 million by a real estate investor and broker in Hawaii.
Just like how Ohtani dealt with the firing and prosecution of his former interpreter, Ippei Mizuhara, Ohtani is solely focused what he can control on the baseball diamond, per Jack Harris of the Los Angeles Times.
“I want to focus on the field,” Ohtani said in Japanese, after the Dodgers lost to the Angels to fall out of first place in the NL West. “Today, this team continued to lose, so I’d like the team as a whole to win a game quickly and try to win each and every game.”
Major League Baseball could potentially opt to have their major annual events such as the postseason switched from national broadcast stations to streaming platforms, reports Andrew Marchand of The Athletic. Marchand notes that both Apple TV+ and Peacock are in contention for the rites to Sunday Night Baseball, while Netflix is a potential suitor to air the World Series and All-Star Game.