Shohei Ohtani hit a 424-foot home run to dead center in the first inning, then went out and threw six no-hit innings against the same team. Against the same lineup. The same guys who just watched the ball disappear into the center field seats now couldn’t get a hit off the man who hit it.
No pitcher in the modern era had ever hit a leadoff home run and then gone out and no-hit people for six-plus innings in the same game. The Shohei Ohtani home run and pitcher combination — as a CONCEPT, as a thing that happens on a baseball field — was already absurd before last night. Then he went and made it more absurd.
The pitching line was 6 IP, 0 H, 1 R (unearned), 4 BB, 7 K, 99 pitches. He walked four guys, which means he was genuinely pissed the entire time he was out there. Multiple outlets noted Ohtani visibly furious on the mound — fist-pumping after strikeouts, seething when he issued walks. That’s the detail that gets me. He threw six no-hit innings and was angry about it. Imagine being that competitive.
The last pitcher who came close to this was Jake Arrieta in 2015, who hit a homer and threw six no-hit innings in the same game — but Arrieta didn’t bat leadoff. The leadoff part is the knife twist. Ohtani hit the homer FIRST. Before he even threw a pitch. He hit it off Tomoyuki Sugano, a former NPB star who knows Ohtani from Japan. Then he walked to the mound and proceeded to make the Rockies look like they’d never seen a baseball before.
His ERA is 0.82. It was 0.73 before last night. This is not a typo.
https://twitter.com/OptaSTATS/status/2049357445013668244
(The night wasn’t perfect — Teoscar Hernandez left in the second with a left hamstring strain and is almost certainly headed to the IL. One hand giveth, etc.)
The combined no-hit bid lasted through seven innings before Tyler Freeman finally got a single in the eighth, which at least gave Colorado fans something to clap about. Freddie Freeman tacked on his own homer two batters after Ohtani’s blast, because that’s just what the Dodgers do. Final: 4-1.
There are other pitchers doing remarkable things this season — Cristopher Sanchez’s scoreless streak had people losing their minds a few weeks ago — but Ohtani exists in a different category. He’s doing things nobody has done, frequently enough that we’re starting to shrug. The Shohei Ohtani home run as a pitcher doing something no one in baseball history has done: a shrug. That’s where we are. He broke us.
