After turning in some up-and-down efforts in 2024 during his first season with the Los Angeles Dodgers, Yoshinobu Yamamoto has been one of the best pitchers, if not players, in all of baseball in 2025.

Through his first four starts of the season, Yamamoto has been on a roll, recording two wins versus just one loss while recording a 1.23 ERA with just 13 hits, four runs, and an ER of three. Yamamoto has allowed just two home runs versus seven walks and 28 strikeouts and looks downright dominant against darn-near everyone.

And in the Dodgers' first game against the Texas Rangers on their road trip, Yamamoto turned in his best game yet at the MLB level, as Blake Harris broke down on social media.

“Yoshinobu Yamamoto just had the BEST START of his career,” Harris wrote. “7 IP, 0 ER, 0 BB, 10 K, 20 whiffs, 0.93 ERA on the season. Best pitcher in baseball.”

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Going up against Jacob deGrom, himself one of the better pitchers in the game, the duo turned in a pitching duel for the ages, with the duo combining for just eight hits, a run, a walk, and 17 strikeouts over their combined 198 pitches. Fortunately for the Dodgers, the only player who went yard against a starter was “Tanks” himself, Tommy Edman, who secured the win for Yamamoto right out of the gates before Teoscar Hernández and Max Muncy added RBIs to the board to give LA a little extra wiggle room.

Signed to the richest contract of any pitcher in baseball history – excluding Shohei Ohtani – fans seriously wondered whether or not Yamamoto would live up to expectations at the MLB level, with other teams repeatedly making fun of Dave Roberts' squad for making a big swing for an unproven performer. Now, the Dodgers look like they have a future Cy Young pitcher playing next to a former two-time winner in Blake Snell, with a .93 ERA. While every deal the Dodgers make may not work out perfectly, it's clear that betting on Yamamoto was an incredible wager that could keep paying out for years to come.