LOS ANGELES — Another Game 1 — and potentially another postseason — careened toward disaster for the Los Angeles Dodgers a mere 8 minutes after the first pitch. A team urged by its manager to deliver the first blow after consecutive playoff flops instead staggered backward again.
But what a difference a year makes. What a difference Shohei Ohtani makes.
That much was clear as the Dodgers, facing a three-run deficit before they took even a single at-bat, searched for their counterpunch and landed on their $700 million man. It was vibrant as Ohtani timed a 97 mph Dylan Cease fastball at the top of the zone and smoked it into the right-field bleachers, tying the game and giving the Dodgers life as they tried to avoid a third such dud in as many postseasons. Dodger Stadium shook as Ohtani flung his bat to the side and watched it fly.
Ohtani has officially arrived in October, as have the Dodgers. They rallied twice from early deficits, survived another implosion from a starting pitcher in the postseason and, with a 7-5 win in Game 1 of the National League Division Series against the San Diego Padres, gave themselves life.
This is the version of the Dodgers that manager Dave Roberts said was coming, be it manifesting hope or sincere belief.
“For me,” Roberts said, “I’m just looking to throw the first punch.”
Instead, he saw his team get off the mat.
“I talked about this for a few weeks — we need to fight,” Roberts said. “And that’s what we did tonight.”
The Dodgers fought despite being in a perilous hole. Not once in 14 attempts had a Dodgers club come back and won a postseason game after trailing by three or more runs after the first inning — including losing 364 days ago, when the Arizona Diamondbacks blitzed Clayton Kershaw for six runs and knocked him out after he had recorded just one out.
That night cast a pall that would not be undone over three nights in an unceremonious sweep. When the Padres bombarded Yoshinobu Yamamoto in the first inning for three runs, including a two-run home run from Manny Machado, it slowed a sold-out Dodger Stadium to something of a crawl.
“I mean, you could almost feel it in the stadium,” Max Muncy said. “Then thankfully we have a guy whose name is Shohei Ohtani and he injected an absolute lightning bolt into the stadium.”
Will Smith’s walk and Gavin Lux’s lined single had put the Padres into a position they hope to avoid as much as possible over the next few games: Ohtani up and nowhere to put him. Any facetious attempts to mask a game plan against him go out the window then. And Cease, who had challenged Ohtani with an elevated fastball in his first at-bat and got him to fly out to shallow left, tried a similar formula to get back into a 2-1 count.
Ohtani connected.
“I thoroughly enjoyed it,” Ohtani said through interpreter Will Ireton.
In his first major-league postseason game, he embraced the moment he chose to sign here for.
“I just really have never seen a guy in the biggest of moments come through as consistently as he has,” Roberts said.
The Dodgers had life again.
“When you have Shohei Ohtani on your team, that always helps,” Freddie Freeman said.
As the Dodgers rolled to erase another deficit two innings later, Ohtani was again in the middle of it all. After Tommy Edman’s bunt single and Miguel Rojas’ liner to left, Ohtani shattered his bat and still muscled the ball into the outfield to load the bases. When Padres reliever Adrian Morejon’s wild pitch brought home a run, Shildt intentionally walked Mookie Betts — even with two strikes. Two batters later, Teoscar Hernández’s single brought home Ohtani and Betts to give the Dodgers a lead they wouldn’t surrender.
It also gave them air. For the first time since Game 4 of the NLDS against these very same Padres, the Dodgers had a lead in a postseason game. For the first time since Game 2 of that series, they had a lead at home.
“From then on it was, ‘Alright, we’ve got this. This is not the same as years past. We’re good,’” Muncy said.
Now, thanks to Ohtani, a gutty performance out of Freeman and six scoreless innings from a bullpen the Dodgers’ have touted amid questions about the rotation, the Dodgers also have a lead in the series.
It took a bit to get there. Ohtani noted some difficulty in firing up in his first instance coming back from a bye. Another brief outing from a starter didn’t help, giving Dodgers starters 18 runs allowed over their last 7 2/3 postseason innings.
It also took what the Dodgers didn’t have last year: perhaps the best player on the planet amid one of the most torrid stretches of his career, hitting well over .500 during what is now a 13-game hitting streak and collecting hits in 14 of his last 17 at-bats with runners in scoring position.
The Dodgers didn’t want Ohtani to have to carry them. So he propelled them instead.
“When you get a player like Shohei, who clearly embraces these moments and has the ability to carry a ballclub, I do think that there’s something to the alleviating the — I hate saying ‘pressure’ — but the pressure for other players,” Roberts said. “He’s just very unique and talented. This is kind of what he’s been ever since an adolescent, I’m sure, the best player on the field.
“I think there’s something to having that superstar player that can carry a ballclub.”
Saturday night, he did just that.
(Top photo of Shohei Ohtani: Harry How / Getty Images)
