Shohei Ohtani Is Managing Three Injuries Through the Playoffs and Cannot Explain Where They Came From
Shohei Ohtani has a strained right biceps, a left knee issue and a neck issue. He has not pitched since the All-Star break. And when he was asked about it on Friday, he said he has not been able to get a good grasp of the root cause of any of it.
That is three separate problems, no diagnosis tying them together, and a team chasing a third consecutive World Series.
What the injuries have already cost
The biggest practical consequence is the mound. Ohtani did not pitch at all after the All-Star break, which removed the entire reason the Dodgers have the most valuable roster construction in baseball.
He also had his first injured list stint as a Dodger. For a player whose availability has been the defining variable of his career, that is not a small line item.
He says he will manage all three through the postseason. He did not pitch in NLDS Game 1 and no timetable for a postseason pitching appearance has been reported.
Game 1 was a mixed bag
Ohtani went 1-for-4 with no RBI in the Dodgers’ 5-3 win over Atlanta on Saturday at Dodger Stadium.
His first at-bat was encouraging: a 105 mph line-drive single to right field. Then he flew out in three straight at-bats and left two runners on base.
One hard single and three fly outs is the box score of a hitter whose timing is close but not there, which is roughly what you would expect from someone carrying a biceps strain and a knee issue.
The Dodgers won anyway, because Tarik Skubal retired 15 Braves in a row and Teoscar Hernandez, Kyle Tucker and Max Muncy all homered.
About the criticism
There has been a wave of commentary calling Ohtani the weakest link in the Dodgers lineup. It is worth being clear about where that is coming from.
The loudest versions of it are anonymous posts on social media, collected and repackaged by aggregation sites. No named analyst, player or outlet has made that case. Treat it accordingly.
Also worth noting what is missing from the reporting: no Dave Roberts comment on the injuries has surfaced, and Ohtani’s full 2026 batting and pitching lines were not detailed in the coverage of his remarks.
Our take
The thing that should concern Los Angeles is not the 1-for-4. It is the sentence about not knowing the root cause.
Three simultaneous soft-tissue and joint complaints in a player who throws 100 mph and swings as hard as anyone alive usually trace back to one mechanical problem. Nobody has found it. That is how you end up managing symptoms in October instead of fixing a cause in March.
Here is the counterargument, and it is strong. The Dodgers won Game 1 with Ohtani going 1-for-4 and not pitching at all. They have Skubal, Blake Snell, Yoshinobu Yamamoto and Tyler Glasnow lined up. Atlanta has two real starters and has to win bullpen games on the road.
Los Angeles built a roster that does not need Ohtani to be Ohtani. That was expensive and it looks smart right now. It also means the best player in baseball is heading into the biggest month of the year as a question mark, and he is the one asking the question.
A longtime sports reporter, Carlos Garcia has written about some of the biggest and most notable athletic events of the last 5 years. He has been credentialed to cover MLS, NBA and MLB games all over the United States. His work has been published on Fox Sports, Bleacher Report, AOL and the Washington Post.
