SAN FRANCISCO — Shohei Ohtani the pitcher is making his quest to win a Cy Young Award look more possible with each start.
But the Dodgers’ offense could sure use a hitter like Shohei Ohtani right now.
While Ohtani pitched six scoreless innings on Wednesday night, he and the rest of the Dodgers’ lineup were held in check for the second night in a row at Oracle Park. A scoreless duel was finally settled when Jack Dreyer surrendered a three-run home run to Patrick Bailey and the San Francisco Giants beat the Dodgers, 3-0.
“He was outstanding,” Dodgers manager Dave Roberts said of Ohtani’s effort on the mound where he has an 0.38 ERA after four starts this season. “You saw it from the outset, just where his head was at, the velocity. It was going to be hard to get runs off him tonight and unfortunately we couldn’t support him on the offensive side.”
The Dodgers have lost four of their past five games. In back-to-back losses to the Giants, they have managed a total of just seven hits and only one run.
“Yeah, not our best,” Dodgers catcher Will Smith said of the two-night slumber. “We know we’re a good offense. We’re gonna have nights like that. Just happened to be two nights in a row.
“I still think it’s quality at-bats. We’re swinging at the right pitches. We’re not chasing a ton. We’re just not really getting the barrel on the ball. So I think it’s the same thing. It’s just a few more barrels.”
Bailey might have rolled out the only barrel of the night.
While Ohtani was dominant on the mound, he went hitless in four at-bats – two weak ground outs, a strikeout and an opposite-field fly out. That snapped his on-base streak at 53 consecutive games, tied with Shawn Green for the second-longest in franchise history (since 1900) and the longest in MLB since a 63-game streak by Orlando Cabrera with the Angels in 2006.
“I’m focused, as a leadoff hitter, to get on base. As long as I feel good overall, then the result will follow. That hasn’t been the case,” Ohtani said through his interpreter.
“The season is not over. If I can start another streak, that would be great. The season is not over yet, so we’ll see how it goes.”
On the mound, Ohtani allowed two hits in the first inning, singles by Luis Arraez and Rafael Devers. But he wrapped three strikeouts around those and retired 11 batters in a row before giving up another hit and 15 out of 16 before running into trouble again in the sixth inning.
With two outs, Matt Chapman beat out an infield single. Rafael Devers followed with a double into the right-field corner, Chapman holding at third. Backed into a corner, Ohtani started Casey Schmitt with a 100 mph fastball then followed with three sweepers to strike him out.
The sweeper was Ohtani’s most effective pitch Wednesday. The Giants swung at it 15 times and missed nine. Ohtani’s fastball also had added life, averaging 98.8 mph. The combo produced seven strikeouts in his six innings.
In his first four starts this season, Ohtani has allowed just two runs in 24 innings.
“He looked really good,” Smith said. “His fastball was really good tonight. It felt really crisp, just getting on guys. The sweeper was really good to the righties.”
Meanwhile, Giants starter Tyler Mahle came into the game with a 7.23 ERA this season, fresh off a start in which he gave up four home runs. The Dodgers did wonders for both his ERA and his self-esteem. They beat the ball into the ground for 10 outs and struck out five times in his seven scoreless innings.
Like they did in Tuesday’s series opener, when they went 0 for 5 with runners in scoring position and left eight runners on base, the Dodgers had activity on the bases Wednesday but nothing came of it.
They put runners at the corners with two outs in the first inning but Teoscar Hernandez grounded out.
Freddie Freeman’s hustle on a Max Muncy single off the second baseman’s glove put runners at second and third with one out in the fourth. But Freeman was out in a rundown when Andy Pages grounded to first with the infield in and Hyeseong Kim grounded out to end the threat.
That was the first of 10 batters retired in order by Mahle to complete his seven-inning effort.
“I thought there were a lot more balls hit well tonight versus last night. Production was the same,” Roberts said.
“I thought each of the nights there were a couple of pivotal at-bats that I think could have pushed a run across, and we didn’t come through situationally. That certainly impacted the outcome of both these games. Up to this point, I think we’ve been pretty good situationally, but these last two — when you’re not hitting homers and you’re not scoring a bunch of runs, you have to be good situationally. The last two, the opportunities that we did have we just couldn’t come through there.”
The game was decided when Dreyer replaced Ohtani in the seventh inning. He gave up back-to-back singles to Jung Hoo Lee and Heliot Ramos to start the inning. A sacrifice bunt moved them into scoring position. It didn’t matter, though. Bailey sent the fifth of five consecutive sliders on a 407-foot journey into the seats in left-center field.
“I think it was just one of those things where he saw a lot of the same pitches, the slider,” Roberts said. “Then he (Dreyer) got count leverage (1-and-2) and tried to bury it and left it up. He put a good swing on it. He left a fastball up to Lee, then a breaking ball or something to Ramos and then obviously right there we needed a strikeout and that’s what they felt was best to get the strikeout. Didn’t get it there.”