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The Los Angeles Dodgers walked into Denver this week knowing they couldn’t afford to stumble. The San Diego Padres have closed the gap in the National League West, and the Dodgers needed to handle business against the last-place Colorado Rockies. Instead, Wednesday night turned into another frustrating Coors Field chapter, capped by Shohei Ohtani’s roughest start in nearly five years and a scare that left Dave Roberts searching for answers.
Ohtani’s night unraveled quickly. Making his first career start at Coors, the two-way superstar gave up five earned runs on nine hits in just four innings. The thin air was unkind to his repertoire, flattening pitches and amplifying Rockies’ contact. His struggles deepened in the fourth inning when Orlando Arcia’s 93 mph line drive struck him squarely on the right thigh. Ohtani crumpled in pain before shaking it off to finish the frame, but the damage—both to the box score and to the Dodgers’ momentum—was done.
“I put the team in a bad spot,” Ohtani admitted through an interpreter after the 8-3 loss. “It was just a very regrettable outing. I wish I could have done better.”
Still, Ohtani managed to extend his on-base streak to 18 games with a double and a walk at the plate, reminding everyone that his bat remains a game-changing force. Roberts, meanwhile, tried to strike a balance between realism and optimism. “The results are the results. The performance is the performance,” the manager said. “I’d like to think it’s not a letdown. But when you’re at Coors and putting together some of these at-bats—I don’t have the answer.”
The Dodgers only hold a one game lead over Padres after loss to Rockies
The Dodgers were grateful the liner missed Ohtani’s knee, avoiding what could have been a catastrophic injury. “I was just really relieved that it was the thigh, because it hit him flush,” Roberts said. “If you’re talking about the kneecap, that’s a different conversation. When I saw the ball mark on his thigh, I was very relieved, relative to the situation.”
Relief aside, Ohtani’s outing raised concerns. He hasn’t pitched more than 4 ⅓ innings or thrown more than 80 pitches in any start this season. After Wednesday, his ERA ballooned from 3.47 to 4.61, with his last two outings producing nine runs and 14 hits in just 8 ⅓ innings. For a Dodgers team counting on him to stabilize the rotation post-elbow surgery, the timing is troubling.
That honesty underscores a larger issue. The Dodgers can’t seem to shake their struggles in Denver. The Rockies, owners of the National League’s worst record, out-hit them 16-7 on Wednesday, piling on against both Ohtani and the bullpen. The loss trimmed Los Angeles’ division lead to a single game, with a crucial weekend series against San Diego looming.
Roberts had already planned to rest Ohtani for Thursday’s finale, but after the line drive scare, that decision is non-negotiable. “Right now it feels pretty good,” Ohtani said. “I’m going to do everything in my ability to make sure that it doesn’t affect me moving forward.”
For the Dodgers, the message is clear: they dodged disaster with Ohtani, but Coors Field remains an unsolved riddle. And unless Roberts’ club finds a way to avoid these letdowns, their grip on the NL West could slip away as fast as a hanging slider in the Denver air.
