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    • Shohei Ohtani stars for Dodgers in playoff debut
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    Shohei Ohtani stars for Dodgers in playoff debut

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    LOS ANGELES – For six seasons, the baseball world wondered what it would be like to see Shohei Ohtani, one of the most electric baseball players of this generation, in the MLB playoffs.

    The San Diego Padres found out the hard way.

    The Los Angeles Dodgers slugger got his offense going with a thunderous three-run home run that propelled his team to a 7-5 victory over their rival in Game 1 of the National League Divisional Series. He proved in his playoff debut that his 10-year, $700 million contract is worth every penny.

    “I could really feel the intensity of the stadium before the game started, and I really enjoyed it,” Ohtani said.

    The first inning was a spectacle Dodger fans have seen many times in recent postseason appearances. The starting pitcher – this time Yoshinobo Yamamoto – was lit before the sun even set on Southern California. A Manny Machado home run capped a three-run drive in the top of the frame for the Padres and the Dodgers were unable to answer in their first time to the plate.

    But all those struggles changed in the bottom half of the second. In the most meaningful at-bat of his career to date, Ohtani took Dylan Cease to right field, threw his bat and screamed as the raucous Dodger Stadium crowd saw the ball go over the right field wall and tie the game.

    No, the swing didn’t win the game. Los Angeles fell behind again the next inning, but another offseason signing came in handy. Teoscar Hernandez, an underrated acquisition before spring training, hit a two-run single in the fourth inning that gave Los Angeles a lead it held for the rest of the game.

    The new additions were exactly what the Dodgers needed when they faltered far too often.

    In the first game of this series alone, the Dodgers scored seven runs. Last season, when the Dodgers were swept by the Arizona Diamondbacks, the offense scored just six runs in three games and the stars were nowhere to be seen. In 2022, when San Diego won three in a row to eliminate them, it scored just seven points in three losses.

    Just when it looked like it would be the start of another rough October in Los Angeles, Ohtani was there to change the narrative.

    “It just got the momentum back for us and gave us life,” manager Dave Roberts said of Ohtani’s home run. “From the first pitch, the fans were just involved, they were into it. I felt that energy and I think Shohei feeds off of that. But that was just a big hit.”

    Even though it was Hernandez who gave the starting signal, he received no credit for leading the team to victory. He deferred all that to his leadoff hitter.

    “(Ohtani) is the guy that will lead us through all of this, and we will follow and try to keep playing at the same level,” Hernandez said.

    Ohtani said he was very happy with the home run from a pitcher like Cease, especially since he was solid against the Dodgers this season. In two starts against Los Angeles, he pitched 10 ⅔ innings and gave up four runs on eight hits with a total of 10 strikeouts, but had not allowed a Dodgers batter to hit one over the fence.

    Padres manager Mike Shildt said Cease had a very good first at-bat against Ohtani when he got him to make a catch in the first inning. But he said he put the pitch — a four-seam fastball at the top of the strike zone — in a spot they didn’t like, and Ohtani made him pay.

    “It’s just about execution, right? You have to be even better against really good players,” Shildt said. “We just had something that was over and he was able to get the bat on it.”

    Although it was his first MLB postseason game, Ohtani is no stranger to the bright lights. He won a title playing in Japan, and who could forget the performance he put on for Japan at the 2023 World Baseball Classic when he was named the tournament’s MVP?

    The slugger said it’s hard to compare his past experiences to his current situation, but he knew the intensity was turned up a notch.

    “I thought it was pretty exciting,” Ohtani said.

    That excitement certainly took the burden off Yamamoto after he gave up three runs in the first and two more in the second before being pulled.

    Yamamoto said he appreciated the offense picking him up. The bullpen also took a big step for Los Angeles. After scoring five runs on five hits in the first three innings, San Diego failed to score again, giving up only two hits and striking out seven in the final six frames.

    The fellow Japanese star said he’s going back to the drawing board to figure out what went wrong. If this series ends up lasting four or five games, as several people expect, he will likely be called up to take the mound again. He added that he just fell behind early in the at-bats, but something else may have played a role; Roberts said it seemed like the Padres noticed what Yamamoto brought.

    “There’s some things I think we’re going to address because I think at second base they had some things with his glove and gave away some throws. So we’re going to clean that up,” he said. “It’s up to us to clean that up and not reveal which pitch we’re going to throw. We are going to clean that up internally.”

    Yet Saturday was all about Ohtani. Not only was there extra attention given that Saturday was his first MLB playoff game, but he also entered the hottest stretch of the season. Since that day in Miami, when he became the first MLB player to hit 50 home runs and 50 stolen bases in a season, he has a .628 batting average with six home runs and 20 RBI. If there are runners in scoring position, it’s almost a guarantee that Ohtani is going to bring them home.

    There was no telling whether Ohtani would be able to keep it up. He even admitted that it’s hard to get comfortable playing that first playoff game when you’ve just been fired. The top two seeds in each league have been given and clearly haven’t helped Los Angeles over the past two seasons.

    But these games are the reasons Ohtani chose to spend the next decade with the Dodgers. He was excited to be in a “high-intensity environment” and if he can perform like he did in Game 1, maybe he can take the Dodgers back to glory.

    “He definitely has that switch, that focus that goes to excitement versus nerves and feeling pressure and trying too hard,” Roberts said. “I’ve honestly never seen a guy come through the biggest moments as consistently as he has. It’s really impressive. I don’t know how he does it.”

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