{"id":661498,"date":"2026-04-03T21:00:23","date_gmt":"2026-04-03T21:00:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/661498\/"},"modified":"2026-04-03T21:00:23","modified_gmt":"2026-04-03T21:00:23","slug":"shohei-ohtani-hits-first-homer-of-the-season-dodgers-roll-past-nats","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/661498\/","title":{"rendered":"Shohei Ohtani hits first homer of the season, Dodgers roll past Nats"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

WASHINGTON\u00a0\u2014\u00a0Shohei Ohtani<\/a> strode out of the batter\u2019s box like a man who knew the changeup he\u2019d just mashed was headed to the right-field seats at Nationals Park.<\/p>\n

It had taken him 20 at-bats, but with that three-run homer, Ohtani finally had his first extra-base hit of the season.<\/p>\n

The Dodgers<\/a>\u2019 13-6 win was powered in large part by an overdue offensive surge from the top of the batting order.<\/p>\n

Going into the series, Ohtani, Kyle Tucker<\/a> and Mookie Betts<\/a> combined for a .541 OPS, the worst mark of any National League team\u2019s No. 1-3 hitters. Freddie Freeman<\/a>, batting fourth against Nationals right-hander Miles Mikolas, wasn\u2019t faring that much better, despite consistent hard contact. He carried a .615 OPS into Friday.<\/p>\n

Then came a lesson in small sample sizes. All four homered Friday \u2014 Ohtani, Betts and Freeman off Mikolas, and Tucker against left-handed reliever Ken Waldichuk.<\/p>\n

Ohtani\u2019s homer started the Dodgers\u2019 scoring spree. Then Tucker singled, and Betts dropped a two-run homer into the visitor\u2019s bullpen.<\/p>\n

Two innings later, Betts lined a single into center field right before Freeman homered to the second deck beyond right field. Tucker put the final touches on what became a four-run rally with a bases-loaded single through the right side of the field.<\/p>\n

Suddenly \u2014 taking advantage of some down-the-middle misses from Mikolas, who had a 7.20 ERA last season with the Cardinals \u2014 the top of the Dodgers\u2019 batting order was performing much closer to expectations.<\/p>\n

Add in Andy Pages<\/a>\u2019 second home run of the season, and Teoscar Hern\u00e1ndez<\/a> RBI double, and the Dodgers scored 11 runs against Mikolas in 4 \u2153 innings.<\/p>\n

The cushion proved helpful as Dodgers starter Emmet Sheehan<\/a> gradually settled in.<\/p>\n

He gave up consistent hard contact in the first inning, including a three-run homer to CJ Abrams. And Abrams continued to haunt him, adding an RBI single in the third.<\/p>\n

\"\" <\/p>\n

Sheehan didn\u2019t give up a run the rest of the way, however, finally handing over the ball two outs into the sixth.<\/p>\n

The Nationals made up some ground late in the game, scoring two runs against Dodgers reliever Edgardo Henriquez<\/a>. But they never truly threatened a comeback.<\/p>\n

Fittingly, Ohtani also drove in the Dodgers\u2019 last run, with a sacrifice fly to the warning track in center field in the ninth inning.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"WASHINGTON\u00a0\u2014\u00a0Shohei Ohtani strode out of the batter\u2019s box like a man who knew the changeup he\u2019d just mashed…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":661499,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2398],"tags":[5,14840,39,25415,815,434,1987,29,8625,4,1526,415,3628,3215,1479,468,4840,4010,414,71,4222],"class_list":{"0":"post-661498","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-washington-nationals","8":"tag-baseball","9":"tag-batting-order","10":"tag-dodgers","11":"tag-first-homer","12":"tag-freddie-freeman","13":"tag-friday","14":"tag-inning","15":"tag-kyle-tucker","16":"tag-mikolas","17":"tag-mlb","18":"tag-mookie-betts","19":"tag-nationals","20":"tag-nationals-park","21":"tag-run","22":"tag-season","23":"tag-shohei-ohtani","24":"tag-three-run-homer","25":"tag-top","26":"tag-washington","27":"tag-washington-nationals","28":"tag-washingtonnationals"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/116342793356691707","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/661498","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=661498"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/661498\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/661499"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=661498"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=661498"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=661498"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}