SACRAMENTO — The Dodgers scratched Shohei Ohtani from his scheduled Wednesday start against the Athletics and said he would instead start Friday at Dodger Stadium against the San Diego Padres.
The Dodgers did not immediately say why they delayed Ohtani’s start or who would start in his place Wednesday. Ohtani is in the lineup at designated hitter for Tuesday’s game.
This series marks the Dodgers’ lone scheduled visit to Sacramento during the A’s three-year stay here. The A’s plan to move into a new ballpark in Las Vegas in 2028, the next time the teams are scheduled to face off.
Ohtani would have been starting on his usual six days rest. However, with the Dodgers on a run of 13 consecutive games without an off day, pushing Ohtani back at some point would allow the Dodgers to better manage his workload.
He is 8-2 with a 1.58 earned-run average this season. Among National League pitchers with at least 70 innings, his ERA is bettered only by Jacob Misiorowski of the Milwaukee Brewers (1.46).
Ohtani already has pitched 79-2/3 innings this season, his most in three years. He spent all of the 2024 season and the first half of the 2025 season rehabilitating from elbow surgery.
On Monday, Dodgers manager Dave Roberts said Ohtani, already elected as the NL designated hitter for next month’s All-Star Game, would not pitch in that game if he were not the starting pitcher.
“He’ll obviously DH and then we’ll go from there,” Roberts said. “I don’t know where he is with the pitching thing. We’ll see.”
The Dodgers have carefully managed Ohtani’s workload as a pitcher and might well prefer he be limited to DH in the game. It also would be impractical to have him warm up during a game in which he were hitting, and Misiorowski and Cristopher Sanchez of the host Philadelphia Phillies are top candidates to be the NL starting pitcher.
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