As they head into an offseason of overdue rest and roster reshaping, the Dodgers really only face one obstacle.
But it’s a $700 million obstacle. It’s a 5,400-mile obstacle. It’s an obstacle whose gravitas can be found in everything from international sponsorships to stadium tours, an obstacle with expansive implications and crushing consequences.
The Dodgers have a Shohei Ohtani problem.
He is their best player… and their biggest pain.
He is insanely charming… and unrelentingly stubborn.
He has derived his worldwide popularity from his ability to hit and pitch with equal prowess, a deft duality unmatched in the history of baseball. This ability has helped earn him four MVP awards and status as the unofficial greatest player ever.
And, yeah, it’s made him very rich, setting him up to sign a 10-year, $700-million contract with the Dodgers based on the notion that he was not one, but two players, an All-Star hitter and an All-Star pitcher.
Three seasons later, he’s earned every penny, leading the Dodgers to two World Series championships while turning them into a global money machine, transforming this once staid organization into one of the most popular sports franchises in the world.
But, he’s changing. His body is changing. His skills are changing. He’s 32, with 13 seasons of professional baseball burdening his lumbering 6-foot-4 frame, and part of his game is slowly disintegrating under the weight.
The problem is his pitching. It’s hurting him. It’s distracting him. It’s exhausting him. His attempts to fix it on the mound led to a badly broken swing at the plate that may have caused the Dodgers to fail in their attempt at a three-peat.
And enough is enough.
This past season offered unassailable proof that Shohei Ohtani can no longer serve as both a full-time hitter and full-time pitcher. The Dodgers have no choice but to act on this truth and make a decision that is not only best for this team, but the long-term future of the organization.
They need to pull him off the pitching mound permanently. And if he insists on continuing this detrimental charade, they need to seriously consider trading him.
Yes, yes, of course, trading Shohei Ohtani might be the dumbest move since the Boston Red Sox traded Babe Ruth. And, don’t forget, Ohtani has a no-trade clause that places him squarely in charge of his future here.
But at some point, if he insists on pitching despite the damage it is doing to his hitting and thus the entire team’s offense, the Dodgers may need to discuss other options with him.
Like, do what’s best for the team or take a hike.
The Dodgers, of course, are saying no such thing. Publicly, despite the hell he put them through, they are still backing him as a pitcher.
”I’m not only expecting him to pitch, we’re excited about him pitching,” Dodgers president of baseball operations Andrew Friedman told reporters Wednesday at his postseason news conference. “The value of it is incredible, and so now it is incumbent on all of us to figure out the best way to do it.”
That’s going to require a lot of figuring, and it comes down to one seven-month task.
“How do we manage through a long season and have him at his best going into October..that’s a challenge,” Friedman said.
Challenge? A better word might be, “Impossibility.”
For all of his optimism, Friedman hedged his bet when asked if it was possible for a pitcher at Ohtani’s age to survive an entire season and postseason as a two-way player.
“I don’t know the answer to that,” he said.
The answer, obviously, would be for Ohtani to walk into Friedman’s office this winter and tell him he’s done pitching and ready to win more MVP awards as a full-time hitter.
But so far, that’s not happening. That’s not even close to happening.
As of his locker-room interview immediately after the Game 4 sweeping by the Milwaukee Brewers last week, Ohtani still insists on pitching.
When asked a direct question about whether he planned to pitch next season, his answer was firm.
“Yes, definitely,” he told reporters through interpreter Will Ireton. “And looking forward to having a better season next year.”
He was also quite clear that he was unhappy ending the season off the mound, and will work on whatever adjustments are required to make sure that doesn’t happen again.
“Not quite satisfied with how things shaped up on the pitching side at the end of the year,” he said. “This year, I haven’t pitched and I haven’t pitched in the postseason. You know, I haven’t been able to really come to grips in terms of what I’ve learned overall this season. It’s something that I’m going to kind of go back to the drawing board in terms of treatment, training program. and see what I can come up with for next season.”
Alas, there is no treatment for age. There is no training program for too many innings. There is nothing he can do to change the downward trajectory of his pitching career enough to save his hitting.
It’s not that he can’t pitch. In 14 starts this year he was 8-2 with a 1.79 ERA. If he devoted all of his time to pitching, he could easily win a couple of Cy Young awards to complement his four MVPs.
But since his second elbow surgery in 2023, he has yet to both hit and pitch in a full season. He strictly batted in 2024 while rehabbing from the surgery, then only started 14 games at the end of the 2025 season while the Dodgers slowly returned him to the mound.
Then came this season, which began with Ohtani openly pursuing a Cy Young Award while pitching at a Cy Young level.
But around midseason, his body began breaking down, the left knee, the right biceps, all of it hurting worse than he’d ever admit. He stopped pitching July 3 but kept working to return to the mound even while his hitting was declining from the constant effort.
The Dodgers should have shut him down in July and not allowed him back on the field in any capacity until he was fully healed. But they bowed to the wishes of their superstar, who insisted on continuing his unicorn quest even though it was clear that age and wear were finally taking its toll.
It was an organizational mistake that arguably cost them their season. He was finally pulled off the bullpen mound and yanked out of the lineup and placed on the injured list in September, but by then it was too late. Not only did he not pitch again, he stopped hitting, batting .192 in the postseason with four singles and a last-gasp home run.
The Dodgers aren’t the Dodgers without Ohtani creating chaos at the top of the order. They had won the previous two World Series titles on the shoulders of Ohtani the hitter, not Ohtani the pitcher.
Remember, he didn’t even pitch in the 2024 postseason, and in the 2025 postseason he recorded a 4.43 ERA in four starts, and yet they won both World Series championships
This current version of the Dodgers have proven they don’t need his pitching, but desperately need his hitting.
Now they need to convince him of that, and it won’t be easy. Being a two-way player is how he made his fortune. Being a two-way player is how he views his very identity.
Surely Ohtani saw this coming. His own father hinted at it in an open letter about his son after last season.
“ I believe the time will eventually come when he’ll focus on either pitching or hitting,” said Toru in a statement. “ If he can’t pitch anymore, I think he could do well as an outfielder. With practice, I’m sure he could handle it.”
Hmmm. The Dodgers could need a left fielder if they trade Teoscar Hernández as expected. Maybe Ohtani will accept surrendering the mound if he is handed a spot in the outfield?
No matter what happens, something has to happen, because what’s happening now is not working.
Shohei Ohtani as a two-way player has become a one-way ticket to disaster, and if he’s not willing to accept that reality, maybe he should be offered a one-way ticket out of Los Angeles.
The post Enough is enough. The Dodgers must stop letting Shohei Ohtani pitch appeared first on Los Angeles Times.
