Dodgers 4, Cubs 1: Yoshinobu Yamamoto starts slightly better than last year for the season-opening win to start the Japan Series

Chad Moriyama 03/18/2025 Game Recaps 9 Comments

While everything about the Japan Series seems to have been a fun experience, the baseball-related stuff started ominously, as the team is already missing Mookie Betts due to illness, and then a half-hour before the game they had to scratch Freddie Freeman.

Less than ideal.

Thankfully, Yoshinobu Yamamoto did slightly better than he did to start 2024, ending his outing with an exclamation point. The bats rallied to support him just in time with a 3-run inning in the 5th, and the bullpen continued where they left off with four scoreless for a 4-1 win to start the year for the Dodgers.

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Starting off, Yamamoto issued a lead-off walk that was partially thanks to the first pitch being a pitch clock violation. Still, he got a scoreless 1st, but the 2nd saw Dansby Swanson got the first hit of the season with a one-out single, and later with two down, Miguel Amaya smacked a double into the gap for the season’s first run to make it 1-0 Cubs.

After an infield single that bounced off his glove to start the 3rd, Yamamoto retired the final nine batters he faced, carving the Cubs to end his outing with an array of nasty splitters.

While he exited the mound down, he left as the winner: 5 IP, 3 H, 1 R, 1 BB, 4 K, 72 Pitches

On the other side, Shota Imanaga got clean innings in the 1st and 3rd, but walked two in the 2nd and 4th. Remarkably, the Dodgers did nothing with either of those golden opportunities, stranding them all and letting Imanaga exit with a 1-0 lead.

The only upside is he had to throw a lot of pitches, and thus Ben Brown entered in the 5th and was greeted rudely. After a strikeout, he issued a walk to Andy Pages and then Shohei Ohtani came through with the first hit of the game for the Dodgers, rifling a 107 mph single to right.

Tommy Edman then hit the next pitch for a single to tie the game at 1-1…

…and a Teoscar Hernandez groundout that followed led to a run because Jon Berti made an ill-advised double-play attempt and threw the ball into the stands. 2-1.

They weren’t done yet, as Will Smith poked a single himself to put them up 3-1.

Brown did get out of the 5th, made it through the 6th, and got two outs in the 7th before handing things off to Eli Morgan for the final out. Morgan got the 8th as well, giving up Michael Conforto‘s first hit (a double), but nothing else.

Old friend Ryan Brasier tried to close the book on the Dodgers in the 9th, but gave up a lead-off Ohtani double and a Teoscar single to make it 4-1.

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For the Dodgers pen, Anthony Banda was first out, getting a clean 11-pitch inning in the 6th. He passed the baton to Ben Casparius, who also got a 1-2-3 inning (despite one deep flyball), showcasing an uptick in velo.

In a more familiar layout, Blake Treinen got the 8th. It was eventually scoreless, though he did hit a batter and allow a steal for some traffic.

In the 9th for his Dodgers debut and first save chance was Tanner Scott, who got a 1-2-3 frame on 10 pitches for the win, including his first strikeout as a Dodger to end it.

Surprisingly nice win considering how things started.

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1-0!

162-0, here we come!

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