PHOENIX — Dodgers manager Dave Roberts had a decision to make.
Before the Diamondbacks’ Ketel Marte delivered the walk-off blow to the Dodgers — a towering home run off reliever Tanner Scott, punctuated by a bat flip — Roberts had to choose whether to send Shohei Ohtani to the plate as a pinch hitter.
In a 3-2 loss, Ohtani, who had the day off after two-way duties the day before, remained in the dugout.
“It has to be the right spot,” Roberts said.
The defensive picture complicated the calculus.
If Scott had thrown a scoreless inning and sent the game into the 10th, Roberts planned to have Ohtani pinch hit for Miguel Rojas, the third batter due up.
In the ninth, however, unless Ohtani replaced designated hitter Will Smith (who ended up hitting a two-out double), Roberts would have had to put in a defensive replacement for the bottom half of the inning.
“I didn’t want to go two innings trying to figure out how to play defense with Shohei then being out of the game,” Roberts said.
Roberts already had been forced to use the rest of his bench.
Third baseman Max Muncy exited in the fifth inning after a collision at first base, and Santiago Espinal replaced him. When rookie left fielder Ryan Ward walked in the seventh inning, the speedier and more defensively sound Alex Call replaced him on the bases. And in the eighth, the right-handed hitting Rojas pinch-hit for Alex Freeland against Diamondbacks left-hander Brandyn Garcia.
The Dodgers had Andy Pages, Kyle Tucker and Smith — none of whom were candidates to be pulled for a pinch-hitter — due up in the ninth. But after Smith hit a two-out double, leaving first base open, the Diamondbacks surely would have intentionally walked Ohtani if he pinch-hit for Espinal.
Then, the Dodgers would have had to reconfigure their defense, likely moving first baseman Freddie Freeman to third, catcher Dalton Rushing to first base and Smith behind the plate, forfeiting the designated hitter spot.
That would mean a shaky defensive lineup with the game still on the line in the ninth, with pitchers forced to hit if it went into extra innings.
So, instead, Roberts saved Ohtani.
“Once we get into extra innings, then I would fire that bullet,” Roberts said.
The Dodgers, however, didn’t get to extra innings. Scott struck out the first batter he faced. Then he threw a fastball down and in to Marte, who managed to get the barrel of his bat to it.
“You’ve got to tip your cap,” Scott said. “He’s a good hitter. Should I have gone up and in? Yeah. Or just a slider. I knew he was going to be aggressive.”
Ohtani dealing with blister
Ohtani has been dealing with a small blister on the middle finger of his right hand for his last couple starts, Roberts said.
“I don’t expect it to affect him going forward,” Roberts said Thursday afternoon, the day after Ohtani held the Diamondbacks to two hits in six scoreless innings. “Even [Wednesday], if we wouldn’t have tacked on, he would’ve stayed in there.”
Roberts pulled Ohtani after the Dodgers pulled out to a seven-run lead in the top of the seventh inning.
Roberts also said he didn’t believe the blister affected Ohtani’s command last week, when he threw six hitless innings against the Rockies but issued four walks and hit a batter.
“When his command has been off, I think it’s a bigger thing than just a blister,” Roberts said. “Because it’s a small blister. That’s just when his mechanics are out of whack.”
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