Roberts Will Talk to Ohtani About Benching Him for NLCS Game 3

A week ago the Dodgers were moving Shohei Ohtani down the order. Now they are discussing whether he should be in it at all. After Monday’s 7-4 loss in Milwaukee put Los Angeles 0-2 down in the National League Championship Series, manager Dave Roberts told The Athletic he would have a conversation with Ohtani on Tuesday about his place in the Game 3 lineup, and he did not rule out benching the four-time MVP, Larry Brown Sports reports. The New York Post reports the decision will come down to whether Ohtani still feels healthy enough to remain the starting designated hitter. Game 3 is Wednesday at Dodger Stadium.

What exactly did Roberts leave open?

Everything except the process. Roberts told The Athletic that it obviously has not been good, that Ohtani does not feel great, and that the two of them would talk on Tuesday about what is best for the player and for the team, adding that Ohtani has earned that conversation. That is a long way from the club’s position entering Monday, when removing Ohtani from the lineup was not under serious consideration, the Post reports. It is also a different kind of decision from the one Roberts made in the division series, when he dropped Ohtani to fifth against Atlanta and Ohtani accepted it in a conversation the night before. Moving a hitter down is a manager’s call. This one, as the Post frames it, runs through the player’s own answer about his body, which is why the outcome sits with Tuesday’s meeting rather than with the lineup card Roberts would prefer to write. The same Milwaukee staff that forced this question also benched its own captain, Christian Yelich, for Game 1 of this series, so neither dugout is treating October reputation as protection.

How bad did Game 2 get for Ohtani?

Bad enough that the low point was a swing at a pitch nowhere near the zone. Ohtani ended the first inning with a three-pitch strikeout on an elevated fastball from rookie Logan Henderson, stranded a runner at second in the second inning, and in the sixth was fooled so completely by a JoJo Romero slider on a checked swing that the bat flew out of his hands, the Post and Yardbarker report. He flied out in the ninth to finish 0-for-4 with two strikeouts, which left him 3-for-20 in the postseason, all singles, with seven strikeouts. Los Angeles managed three hits all night, and Henderson’s two throwing errors were needed to gift the Dodgers two of their runs. One detail from before the game reads differently now: Ohtani took batting practice on the field for a third straight day, the Post reports, a change of routine for a player who normally hits only in the indoor cages, and the coaches who liked the look of his swing on Sunday were watching a different hitter by Monday night.

What is actually wrong with him?

The Dodgers have never put one clean diagnosis on it, and the reporting reflects that. The Post describes ongoing right arm and left knee issues, with Ohtani playing at what the team has repeatedly acknowledged is well below 100 percent. The arm problem ended his season as a pitcher earlier in the year, and in September he asked to focus only on hitting. The numbers since then describe a hitter compensating rather than driving the ball: The Athletic’s figures, carried by Heavy, have him at .157 with one RBI since August 19, rarely pulling the ball or hitting it hard, and trying to shorten his swing. Roberts said on Sunday that Ohtani was certainly not 100 percent but good enough. The benching conversation exists because Monday raised the question of whether good enough still holds, in a series where Milwaukee’s bullpen has allowed one earned run in 28 2/3 postseason innings and there is no soft at-bat left to hide in.

Who plays if Ohtani sits?

Most likely a 21-year-old who was in Double-A last month. Josue De Paula was called straight up from Double-A in September and has reached safely in more than half of his 45 major-league plate appearances, the Post reports, including a pinch-hit walk that set up the game-winning rally in Game 4 of the NLDS and another in a failed ninth-inning comeback in Game 1 of this series. The DH spot could instead return Kike Hernandez to the lineup, or fit Miguel Rojas in as an extra right-handed bat against left-handed starter Robert Gasser. Each option gives the Dodgers a healthier hitter and takes away the one swing in the order Milwaukee still has to plan around, which is the trade Roberts has to price. It is the same roster pressure that has run through this series from the other side, where Will Smith’s two declined ABS challenges in Game 2 became a story about a catcher protecting his pitcher: in a 0-2 hole, every regular decision gets re-examined as if it were a gamble.

What happens next?

Tuesday’s conversation, then Wednesday’s lineup card. If Ohtani tells Roberts he can go, the likeliest outcome is that he starts, possibly lower in the order against Gasser, and the story becomes the one at-bat that either ends the slump or deepens it. If he sits, it will be the first time in his Dodgers career that health, not rest, has removed him from a postseason lineup, and De Paula becomes the youngest player to start an NLCS game for the club this year. Ohtani has not spoken to reporters since before the NLDS, the Post reports, so Roberts’s version of the conversation may be all that is said publicly. Either way, the decision lands before first pitch on Wednesday, with the Dodgers two losses from elimination and one more from a 0-3 hole only one team has ever climbed out of.