Dodgers Digest Los Angeles Dodgers Baseball Blog
The Dodgers (3-1) lost their first game of the season last night as the offense continued its early-season struggles. Rookie Parker Messick tossed six scoreless innings and only allowed one Dodger to reach second (Miguel Rojas, who doubled and then for some reason got picked off second with two on and no outs and the top of the order up). Roki Sasaki was solid, allowing a run and four hits over four innings with four strikeouts and only two walks allowed, which is a huge improvement for him. He threw a few too many non-competitive pitches, but threw 45 strikes in his 78 pitches (which again, big improvement for him). He did give up a run and Justin Wrobleski gave up three in the seventh, which put the game out of reach. The Dodgers did threaten a bit in the ninth, but fell 4-2 for their first loss of the season. Today, they look to bounce back and maybe score first for the first time this season.
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| 7:10 P.M. | Los Angeles | ||
| LF | Kwan (L) | DH | Ohtani (L) |
| RF | DeLauter (L) | RF | Tucker (L) |
| 3B | Ramírez (S) | SS | Betts |
| DH | Manzardo (L) | 1B | Freeman (L) |
| 1B | Hoskins | C | Smith |
| C | Naylor (L) | 3B | Muncy (L) |
| 2B | Rocchio (S) | RF | T. Hernández |
| SS | Arias | CF | Pages |
| RF | Martínez (S) | 2B | Freeland (S) |
| P | Bibee (R) | P | Ohtani (R) |
Shohei Ohtani gets his first start of the season and his 15th as a Dodger. Ohtani was excellent in his 14 starts last season with a 2.47 ERA/1.90 FIP and 62 strikeouts in only 47 innings. He wasn’t fully built up and as the everyday DH, half of Ohtani’s starts last season were essentially his rehab assignment. He didn’t pitch into the fourth until his seventh start of the season, where he ended up leaving the game in Cincinnati with the bases loaded and no outs in the inning with a cramp. He was treated a bit more like a legit starter in August and September, going at least four innings in six of his seven starts (and the one he didn’t was when he was sick and had missed a start, but ended up spot starting after Tyler Glasnow was scratched from a start with back tightness). Ohtani had a pair of rough starts in Anaheim (four runs in 4 1/3 innings) and Colorado (five runs in four innings), but that accounted for nine of the 15 runs he allowed last season. He ended the season very strong, allowing eight hits and two walks in 14 2/3 innings over his final three starts.
Ohtani made four starts in the playoffs and went six innings in three of them, but allowed 10 runs in 20 1/3 innings. He dominated the Brewers in his NLCS start, allowing two hits and three walks in six shutout innings with 10 strikeouts and hit three homers at the plate. He took the loss in Game 4 of the World Series, allowing four runs in six innings and came back three days later to start Game 7. Ohtani battled out of trouble in the first couple innings, but couldn’t get out of the third after a Bo Bichette three-run homer chased him from the game in what was thankfully not the biggest moment from that game. Ohtani only made two starts this Spring due to the World Baseball Classic, where he didn’t pitch at all. When he came back, he made two starts (61 and 86 pitches). His final start came in the freeway series a week ago, and Ohtani gave up three runs in four innings but struck out 11 Angels.
Tanner Bibee gets his second start of the season after getting the ball on Opening Day for the Guardians. Bibee allowed four hits in five innings, but three of those were solo homers. He did strike out seven but each of the four hits went for extra bases and of the 11 balls put in play off Bibee, six had an exit velocity over 100 MPH (and one was 99.6 MPH). Bibee only allowed an 88.5 MPH average exit velocity in 2025, but the Mariners averaged 97.3 MPH off him. Obviously small sample size, but that was higher than any start he had last year (94.4 MPH on July 26). 2025 was the worst season of Bibee’s short career, with a career-worst 4.24 ERA and 4.34 FIP in 182 1/3 innings. He did throw two complete games, including an eight-inning complete game where the Guardians lost and he gave up 11 hits and five runs but they kept him in? This will be Bibee’s third time seeing the Dodgers. He started in LA in 2024 and allowed two runs and four hits in five innings, but allowed four runs and seven hits (including an Ohtani homer) in Cleveland against the Dodgers last May.
Bibee throws six different pitches and didn’t throw any pitch more than 30 percent of the time in 2025. He led with a four seamer (27.9 percent) and also threw a cutter (20.7 percent), sweeper (16 percent), sinker (15.2 percent), change (15.2 percent) and curve (5.1 percent). His pitch mix was much less diverse against lefties, where he threw a four seamer 34 percent of the time and a changeup 25 percent of the time. He led with a cutter (27 percent) and sinker (26 percent) against righties. In his first start this season, Bibee basically stuck with the four seamer (33.3 percent), change (30.8 percent) and cutter (26.9 percent).
The Dodgers roll out their normal lineup against righties, with Will Smith back in the lineup and Alex Freeland starting at second. Rhys Hoskins starts for the Guardians, with Kyle Manzardo serving as DH and Chase DeLauter getting the start in right.
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This Guardians series is sandwiched by off days, so the Dodgers will keep their rotation in order coming out of the off day Thursday.
Emmet Sheehan will start on Friday and Glasnow will get the start on Saturday. Sasaki would be lined up to pitch the finale in Washington, but they could opt to throw Wrobleski also on normal rest to give Sasaki and Ohtani an extra day off. It would probably be a nicer landing spot to have Sasaki throw against the Nats than in the a World Series rematch in Toronto.
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First pitch is scheduled for 7:10 PM PT and will be on SportsNet LA.
