Los Angeles Dodgers starting pitcher Roki Sasaki had another overall poor start in Spring Training against the Kansas City Royals, raising the level of concern around the highly-touted pitcher.
Sasaki pitched 3.1 innings on Tuesday night, though not all of them were concurrent. He ended up walking three hitters in a row during the third inning.
The bases were loaded, and as he lost command of all his pitches, Sasaki got pulled from action, coming back in the fourth inning.
He gave up a two-run homer during the inning, but got out of it. In the fifth inning, he gave up a hard-hit double, and that ended his night after a total of 71 pitches.
On the whole, Sasaki threw only 38 strikes. He had 26 swings on the night, seven of which were whiffs, while he only got a total of 12 called strikes.
His fastball was spinning less than it did on average in 2025 — a concerning note for the righty.
The velocity looked promising, with an average of 98 mph and a peak of 99 mph. It was still not the speed he showed in Japan, but his pitch is climbing in speed, and his mechanics look more consistent.
Roki Sasaki breaks down the start
While he acknowledged that the results were rough, Sasaki was quite relaxed given his struggles, shrugging them off as simply a product of Spring Training testing.
“From the standpoint of results, I’m glad this was Spring Training. If I’m able to pitch the entire season, I don’t think anyone will remember Spring Training,” Sasaki said.
Sasaki seemed to be trying to perfect his mechanics and focused on the mechanics of his delivery, which left him a bit lost rather than pitching on pure feel.
There was a similar sensation when he pitched during the start of the 2025 regular season.
“I have a lot of things I need to work on,” Sasaki said through an interpreter. “But it’s just Spring Training, so just keep continuing to work on that. The results in Spring Training don’t really matter.”
It is no secret why Sasaki had success in the playoffs, when he straight-up pitched to his strengths and competed, rather than trying to iron out kinks.
He used the fastball-splitter combo successfully, but with him trying to mix in his new cutter, there is seemingly a long way to go before it becomes consistent out of his hand.
