When Shohei Ohtani’s third residence run rocketed off his bat and streaked towards the left-field bleachers, the few followers nonetheless sitting at Dodger Stadium rose frantically, as if each single seat within the sold-out constructing had acquired a shock.
On the plate and on the mound, Ohtani was merely electrifying in Sport 4 of the Nationwide League Championship Sequence whereas he conjured one of many biggest single-game performances in baseball historical past — even perhaps all of sports activities.
The Los Angeles Dodgers’ two-way celebrity delivered the thirteenth three-homer recreation in postseason annals Friday night time, connecting within the first, fourth and seventh innings for 3 epic solo pictures touring a mixed 1,342 toes.
He was equally sensible on the mound, throwing scoreless, two-hit ball into the seventh inning with 10 strikeouts and a masterful selection in his 100 pitches.
Ohtani additionally did all of it at an awfully necessary second for his group: The Dodgers’ 5-1 victory over the Milwaukee Brewers despatched the defending champions again to the World Sequence with a four-game sweep of the majors’ finest regular-season squad.
“That was probably the greatest postseason performance of all time,” Dodgers supervisor Dave Roberts mentioned. “There’s been a lot of postseason games. And there’s a reason why he’s the greatest player on the planet. What he did on the mound, what he did at the bat, he created a lot of memories for a lot of people.”
After the raucous postgame celebration of the Dodgers’ second straight NL pennant since he joined the membership, Ohtani tried to deflect a number of the highlight to his teammates.
“There were times during the postseason where Teo (Teoscar Hernández) and Mookie (Betts) picked me up, and this time around, it was my turn to be able to perform,” Ohtani mentioned by means of his interpreter. “And I think just looking back over the course of the entire postseason, I haven’t performed to the expectation, but I think today we saw what the left-handed hitters could do.”
One left-handed hitter particularly carried the Dodgers to the World Sequence — and Ohtani, who reached base 4 instances in 4 plate appearances, even recognized the proper capper to his historic night.
“This is really a team effort, so I hope everybody in LA and Japan and all over the world can enjoy a really good sake,” mentioned Ohtani, a connoisseur of the famed Japanese rice wine, whereas the gang roared.
Ohtani earned the NLCS MVP award nearly solely on the energy of this one iconic recreation. He was 2 for 11 with a triple and three walks within the first three video games of the collection.
He had been in an October stoop by his lofty requirements, going 6 for 38 within the postseason and sitting on an eight-game homer drought after hitting a franchise-record 55 within the common season.
That’s the character of Ohtani’s boundless expertise, nonetheless: He can remodel right into a sporting superhero seemingly each time he chooses, and the mound was his phone sales space in Sport 4.
“The way he was struggling this postseason, and not to let it affect him and keep his psyche, his confidence, the same, is really impressive,” Roberts mentioned. “So we knew that he was going to come through at some point. And what better night to do it while he was pitching, too.”
After Ohtani struck out three Brewers within the high of the primary inning, he hit the primary leadoff homer by a pitcher in main league historical past through the backside half — and his night time of unimaginable feats was simply starting.
His second homer was a jaw-dropping, 469-foot drive that cleared the pavilion roof in right-center — a spot the place few homers ever land — after leaving his bat at 116.9 mph.
His seventh-inning shot settled within the left-center bleachers and crushed the Brewers, who had lastly chased him from the mound by getting two runners on within the high of the inning, solely to go scoreless anyway when reliever Alex Vesia escaped the jam.
The three-time MVP is the primary participant with a three-homer postseason recreation since Chris Taylor did it for the Dodgers in October 2021. Kiké Hernández, Ohtani’s present teammate, additionally achieved the feat for Los Angeles within the 2017 NLCS.
Ohtani turned the third pitcher and first in 87 years to hit three homers in a recreation through which he was a beginning pitcher, in response to the Elias Sports activities Bureau. The others had been Jim Tobin for the Boston Braves on Might 13, 1942, and Man Hecker for Louisville on Aug. 15, 1886.
Ohtani, who hadn’t gone deep since hitting two in Los Angeles’ playoff opener in opposition to Cincinnati, is the primary Dodgers participant with two multihomer video games in a single postseason. He additionally turned the primary participant with two homers in any recreation with 116 mph or increased exit velocity since Statcast began monitoring in 2015.
And the right-hander was excellent on the mound as nicely.
He issued two early walks however didn’t enable successful till Jackson Chourio led off the fourth with a ground-rule double. Ohtani stranded him with a grounder and two strikeouts.
He obtained two extra punchouts within the fifth and sixth, with Dodgers followers rising for ovations every time he walked again to the dugout to alternate his glove for a bat.
Whereas his two-way function requires in depth off-field work to remain prepared for each jobs, Ohtani had pitched in solely two video games over the previous 30 days earlier than Sport 4, due to the permutations of the Dodgers’ schedule.
In his final regular-season begin, Ohtani pitched six scoreless innings of five-hit ball in opposition to Arizona on Sept. 23, throwing a season-high 91 pitches. In his MLB postseason mound debut Oct. 4, he gave up three runs over six innings with 9 strikeouts to earn the victory in Los Angeles’ 5-3 win at Philadelphia within the Division Sequence opener.
Ohtani additionally had the motivation of matching his fellow Dodgers starters, who’ve been phenomenal on the mound ever because the playoff race obtained severe.
The Dodgers’ rotation held batters in September to an MLB record-low .173 common for a single month. For the reason that postseason started, Los Angeles’ 4 beginning pitchers — Blake Snell, Yoshinobu Yamamoto, Tyler Glasnow and Ohtani — have allowed simply 10 earned runs whereas pitching 64 1/3 innings with 81 strikeouts over their 10 playoff video games.
Ohtani and the Dodgers have earned every week off earlier than the World Sequence begins subsequent Friday at both Toronto’s Rogers Centre in opposition to the Blue Jays or Chavez Ravine in opposition to the Seattle Mariners.
This membership has struggled with lengthy layoffs in previous postseasons, however Ohtani acknowledged he can use a break — and the Dodgers will spend at the least the subsequent couple of days basking within the brilliance they witnessed whereas punching their ticket to the Fall Traditional.
“I do see it as a positive in terms of being able to rest, both as a position player and as a pitcher,” Ohtani mentioned. “We’ve had some off days, but we’ve played some very meaningful games that were very stressful.”
