Ohtani reaches base nine times with two home runs and two doubles – a day before starting as the Game 4 pitcher.
By MIKEY HIRANO CULROSS
Rafu Sports Editor
It was 11:50 p.m. at Dodger Stadium on Monday night, the temperature was around 63 degrees, a light fog had begun to settle into Chavez Ravine, and Yoshinobu Yamamoto was warming up in the bullpen.
Yes, that Yoshinobu Yamamoto, the same guy who threw a complete game barely 48 hours earlier, on the other side of the continent, in the World Series.
The Japanese right-hander wasn’t called on to pitch after all, thanks to Freddie Freeman’s walk-off home run in the 18th inning that gave the Dodgers a 6-5 win over the visiting Toronto Blue Jays in Game 3.
The contest matched the longest World Series game ever, tying the 18 innings it took to decide Game 3 of the 2018 series – also played at Dodger Stadium, ending with Max Muncy’s walk-off shot against the Boston Red Sox.
After more than six and a half hours of baseball, L.A. heads into Game 4 with a 2-1 series lead and Shohei Ohtani expected to get the start.
Speaking of Ohtani, he continued to post amazing numbers this postseason, tying a record nine times on base in Monday’s game, a feat that had been done only once before, and never in a postseason game.
Ohtani walked five times – four of those intentionally – but was anything but passive in his official at-bats, going 4-for-4 with two home runs and two doubles.
“The most important thing today is that we won,” Ohtani said on the TV broadcast after the victory. “Whatever I did individually, what matters most is that we flip the page after winning this game.”
The interview was brief, for sure, as Ohtani needed to rest up for tomorrow’s start on the mound.”
“I want to get home and go to sleep as soon as possibly,” he said succinctly.
Dodger manager Dave Roberts said he fully understands why Toronto skipper John Schneider chose to repeatedly intentionally walk Ohtani in key situations.
“I get it,” Roberts admitted. “He’s the best player on the planet, and he was on the heels of a huge offensive night, and John smelled that, and wasn’t going to let Shohei beat him at all, obviously, and even when nobody’s on base and putting him on to make the other guys beat him … fortunately, we have other guys behind Shohei that can still do some things.”
The Dodgers’ most glaring weakness this postseason was supposed to be their relief pitching, but their bullpen was sparkling on Monday. Both teams used all their relievers, and with a 19th inning looming, the Blue Jays had Shane Bieber – the scheduled Game 4 starter – getting ready to pitch, while the Dodgers were set to make a bold move.
A month ago, 25-year-old Will Klein was sitting at home in Arizona, left off the Dodgers’ postseason roster. On Monday, he was the last available reliever and rose brilliantly to the occasional, throwing four shutout innings, allowing one hit and striking out five.
“I don’t know how I kept going. I just knew every inning I went out there, it was going to be another zero, and if I had to keep going out there, it would be more zeroes,” said Klein, whose 72 pitches was nearly double his previous high in the major leagues.
Even the soon-to-be-retired Clayton Kershaw entered the game to get the final out of the 12th inning and end a bases-loaded threat by Toronto.
With only position players and starting pitchers remaining available to Roberts, Yamamoto took it upon himself to approach pitching coach Mark Prior and offer to take the ball in the 19th. He was well into his warm-up pitches when Freeman’s fly ball cleared the centerfield wall to end the marathon game.
Roberts said the decision had already been made to send in Yamamoto, and that he would have gone as long as needed.
“It just speaks to how guys will do anything to win a championship, and they’re laying it out there.
“It took everyone on our roster to win one ballgame tonight,” Roberts said of the team’s effort, after what he called one of the greatest World Series games of all time.
“There’s just a lot of heroes tonight. Obviously, Freddie put the exclamation mark on the game, but you see what Will Klein did, you know, saw what Edgardo [Henriquez], [Justin ]Wrobleski. Clayton comes in. He was up for three innings and comes in and gets a huge out for us. Just across the board everyone just had huge nights. Big nights, just kept kind of fighting, kept fighting.”
Roki Sasaki entered the game in the eighth and recorded five outs before giving way in the ninth.
“Everyone on the team worked their asses off to get here, and I wasn’t going to be the one who put that to waste,” Klein added amid the postgame celebration on the field.
The first pitch of Game 4 is set for 5:08 p.m. on Tuesday, broadcast locally on Fox11. Roberts said Ohtani was elated but a bit worn after Monday’s emotional win, but would make the scheduled start.
“Yeah, he’s taking the mound tomorrow. He’ll be ready,” Roberts said.