TOKYO — For all the memorable cultural experiences they’d enjoyed off the field, and all the eye-opening revelations they’d made about the club’s growing popularity here in Japan, the baseball side of the Dodgers’ season-opening trip to Tokyo hadn’t gotten off to a seamless start.
Mookie Betts was ruled out of action after arriving in Tokyo battling a stomach virus, and eventually forced to make an early return home to Los Angeles on Monday night after losing almost 15 pounds.
Freddie Freeman was scratched from the Dodgers’ opening day lineup shortly before first pitch Tuesday night, after experiencing what the team termed as left rib discomfort following pregame batting practice.
And, after getting shut out in a Sunday exhibition against a Japanese team at the Tokyo Dome, the Dodgers began their regular season without a hit for the first four innings against Chicago Cubs ace — and star Japanese left-hander — Shota Imanaga, twice coming up empty in innings they drew two walks.
But then, the defending World Series champions started doing exactly what their nearly $400-million roster was built to this season.
They worked counts, strung together hits and manufactured runs. They leaned on dominant starting pitching, then a revolving door of reliable arms out of the bullpen. They absorbed an early one-run deficit, and flipped it in a matter of moments in the fifth inning.
By the end of the night, it amounted to an auspicious start to a 2025 season of ambitious expectations, the Dodgers beating the Cubs 4-1 before a pro-Dodger crowd on the other side of the globe.
This week’s trip, of course, was always destined to be about more than just baseball.
It was a culmination of sorts in the Dodgers’ pursuit to “paint Japan blue” — giving them an international platform to showcase their star Japanese trio of Shohei Ohtani, who was playing his first career MLB game back in his home nation; Yoshinobu Yamamoto, who squared off against Imanaga in the first all-Japanese opening day pitching matchup in major league history; and Roki Sasaki, who will make his big league debut in Wednesday’s Tokyo Series finale.
It was an opportunity for their new-look roster — which spent big again this winter in pursuit of a second straight championship — to grow closer off the field in foreign surroundings, with team-bonding efforts aided by a private sushi dinner organized by Ohtani, Yamamoto and Sasaki on Sunday night.
It was also a chance for the sport to be celebrated on a global stage, with the influence of Japanese players in the majors — thanks in small no part to Ohtani, whose three MVPs have raised his celebrity level in Japan to unimaginable magnitudes — seemingly at an all-time high.
“I think the last handful of days you could see how excited the fans were, the people of Tokyo were,” manager Dave Roberts said pregame. “The players are ready to get going.”
And though it took the Dodgers five innings to get going themselves, they didn’t look back once they did.
Held hitless through the first four frames by Imanaga, who stranded two pairs of walks in the second and fourth innings, the Dodgers immediately jumped on Cubs reliever Ben Brown in the fifth.
After Andy Pages drew a one-out walk, Ohtani got the rally started in earnest, sending a 107-mph line drive buzzing past Pages and into right field for a single. It was the Dodgers’ first hit, and put a jolt of energy into the sellout crowd, which watched his at-bats Tuesday in eerie silence broken by sudden gasps every time he took a swing or made contact.
From there, the Dodgers just kept coming. Tommy Edman tied the score with a single to left. Teoscar Hernández hit a potential double-play chopper that was instead thrown away by Cubs second baseman Jon Berti, allowing Ohtani to score the go-ahead run. Will Smith doubled the lead with another RBI single.
Five batters. Three runs. One game-changing inning.
The 3-1 lead was plenty for Yamamoto, who followed up a strong spring camp with an impressive five-inning, one-run start; and the Dodgers bullpen, which got to trot its newest toy, $72-million offseason signing Tanner Scott, out to close the game in the ninth inning, after Ohtani generated an insurance run in the top half of the inning by lining a double and scoring on Hernández’s RBI single.
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