A pair of baseball heroes in their native Japan will face off Wednesday when the Colorado Rockies’ Tomoyuki Sugano and the Los Angeles Dodgers’ Shohei Ohtani each take the mound.
It is a rare matchup between pitchers born in Japan, with the last three all relevant. Ohtani faced the San Diego Padres’ Yu Darvish in 2023 as a member of the Los Angeles Angels, while the Dodgers’ Yoshinobu Yamamoto was matched up against Darvish in the 2024 playoffs.
Last season, Yamamoto took the mound for the Dodgers in Tokyo opposite the Chicago Cubs’ Shota Imanaga.
Sugano, 35, is testing himself in the major leagues for a second season after a dominating 12 seasons in Japan with the Yomiuri Giants. His uncle Tatsunori Hara is a Hall of Famer in Japan after hitting 382 career home runs.
Sugano (4-3, 3.86 ERA), who pitched for the Baltimore Orioles last season, has two career starts against the Dodgers, going 0-2 with a 10.29 ERA. He gave up five runs on nine hits over four innings against Los Angeles last month, allowing a home run to Max Muncy.
Sugano said he was “obviously excited” to be pitching at Dodger Stadium for the first time.
“Personally, I don’t know what this means, but I’m sure there’s a lot of fans in Japan who are excited,” Sugano said through an interpreter. “Hopefully we can try to make this exciting.”
Sugano will have to be at his best while facing Ohtani (4-2, 0.73), who is pitching as well as anybody in the major leagues.
The start was put in doubt briefly Tuesday when Ohtani was hit on the back of the right hand by a pitch, but he remained in the game. Los Angeles manager Dave Roberts said Ohtani still will pitch but he might not serve as the designated hitter as well.
Ohtani has allowed an earned run in just three of his eight starts this season and is coming off consecutive scoreless outings. He did not allow a run over five innings while earning the win last Wednesday at San Diego.
In two career starts against the Rockies, Ohtani is 1-1 with a 4.91 ERA.
Muncy will make his first start at third base since Friday when he was hit by a pitch on the right wrist in a game at Milwaukee. Enrique Hernandez will go on the injured list with an oblique strain, while Alex Freeland is expected to be recalled.
Los Angeles used a new-look lineup Tuesday with Mookie Betts moved to the cleanup spot and Andy Pages moved up to the second spot in the order.
Betts, who hasn’t hit lower than third since 2017, delivered a pair of home runs for his first multi-homer game in more than a year. Before Tuesday, Betts was batting just .157 in 12 games since returning from an oblique injury on May 11. Pages tied a career high with four hits.
Betts said a recent mechanical adjustment has him back on track after previous adjustments had been counterproductive.
“I have a directive (now) and I know exactly what I need to do every day,” Betts said. “That doesn’t mean it’s going to translate into hits but I know exactly how to train my body, train my mind into letting it translate on the field now.”
–Field Level Media
