The Los Angeles Dodgers handily beat the San Francisco Giants in Shohei Ohtani’s first start of the year Wednesday.
Ohtani had a stellar outing for LA, striking out four batters through 4.1 scoreless innings. He allowed four baserunners in the contest, but only gave up one hit. The right-hander had some difficulty with location, but made up for it with his velocity, which reached 99 on his four-seamer.
The Dodgers got on the board early to give Ohtani a cushion, scoring two runs in the bottom of the first inning. They hit three straight singles to kick off the bottom of the first, with Miguel Rojas crossing the plate on the third. Teoscar Hernandez hit a bloop single to center shortly after to score Freddie Freeman, who recorded the second hit of the inning.
Freeman accounted for the Dodgers’ next run as well, as he hit a long home run to left-center field in the bottom of the third.
Nick Senzel extended the lead in the bottom of the seventh inning, crushing a sinker over the left field wall for his third home run of spring training.
San Francisco scored their first run of the game in the top of the eighth inning, when Tanner Scott gave up a solo shot to Victor Bericoto with two outs.
LA’s pitching performed well outside of the single mistake, marking another strong showing following their embarrassing 24-9 loss against the Brewers on Monday. Blake Treinen, Alex Vesia, Edgardo Henriquez, Will Klein and Ohtani all had scoreless outings in the game. Scott struck out two batters during his outing, and only allowed the one run.
The game suddenly ended following the eighth inning due to the heat in Phoenix, with temperatures climbing as high as 98 degrees during the game.
The Dodgers have just two Cactus League games remaining before their three-game exhibition series against the Los Angeles Angels, which marks the end of the preseason and the regular season.
Their next game comes against the Padres on Friday, where Opening Day starter Yoshinobu Yamamoto will take the mound for the final time before the beginning of the regular season.
Who was your player of the game?
