It was the sky, not the opposing team, that stopped Shohei Ohtani (29, LA Angels), who was aiming for the third starter of the season. Ohtani played the least innings in two years due to a rain delay.
On the 18th (Korean time), Ohtani was named in the lineup as the team’s second batter and starting pitcher in the 2023 Major League (MLB) away game against the Boston Red Sox held at Fenway Park in Boston, Massachusetts, USA.
The match that day was a match with bad conditions overlapping for Ohtani.메이저사이트 In local standards, April 17 is Patriot Day, a public holiday in Massachusetts, and the day when the Boston Marathon, a large marathon, is held. Because of this, the game was scheduled to start at 11:10 am. It was a time that is difficult to experience normally. In addition, the game started after an hour of waiting due to rain in the Boston area.
After barely starting the game, Ohtani stood out first at the plate. After one out in the first inning, Ohtani survived with a hit to the center fielder and went to second base when the next hitter, Taylor Ward, hit the ball. He then stepped on the home run when Hunter Renfro’s three-run home run in the fourth time, becoming the protagonist of the first run.
Ohtani also created chances for first and third base with a right-handed hit in the second at-bat in the second inning. Here, when Renfro grounded in the infield, the third base runner stepped home, and the Angels widened the score.
On the other hand, on the mound, he showed a somewhat shaky appearance in the beginning. At the end of the first inning, lead hitter Raimel Tapia was sent out on a straight walk, and then Rafael Devers at bat in the second inning, he committed a series of wild fights and was driven to third base safely. In the end, Ohtani allowed a runner on third to score on Rob Lefsnyder’s shortstop grounder.
However, in the second episode Ohtani was completely different. Using a new weapon, the sweeper, he treated lead batter Triston Casas with a floating ball in center field, and ended the inning by striking out Kike Hernandez and Liz Maguire in quick succession.
Here came Ohtani’s second bad news. In the beginning of the 3rd inning, with the Angels on 1st and 2nd base with 2 out, it rained again at Fenway Park. In the end, the game was stopped again, and it was delayed for nearly an hour and a half. As the game stopped for a long time, Ohtani’s shoulders had no choice but to cool down, and he was eventually replaced by left-hander Tucker Davidson in defense at the end of the third inning and finished pitching.
Since then, Ohtani has focused on batting. In the beginning of the 4th inning, he was withdrawn due to a fly ball from center fielder, but in the beginning of the 6th inning, the opposing pitcher made a mistake on the throw and came back to first base. However, he attempted to steal second base and was tagged out.
On this day, Ohtani recorded 2 hits, 1 walk, 3 strikeouts and 1 run in 2 innings as a pitcher, and 2 hits and 1 run in 5 at-bats as a batter. It was the first time Ohtani threw less than 2 innings since the New York Yankees match on July 1, 2021 (⅔ innings, 2 hits, 4 walks, 7 runs). He threw from a rain-soaked mound, and difficult things overlapped, such as a breakdown of the ‘pitch com’, an electronic device that exchanges pitching signs.
Ohtani also had a meaningful confrontation on the mound. It was against Japanese outfielder Masataka Yoshida (30). At the end of the first inning, Ohtani, who faced Yoshida, won the game with three consecutive breaking balls, including a sweeper in the middle from the first pitch. Then, on the 4th pitch, he threw a high fastball at 98.4 miles per hour (about 158.4 km) and struck out Yoshida on a swing.
Meanwhile, the game ended with the Angels winning 5-4. The Angels, who had led 5-1 until the 5th inning, gave up 2 runs in the bottom of the 6th amid poor defense by pitcher Aaron Roof, and the crisis continued after that. But in the end, I was able to keep the lead and win.