Shohei Ohtani pitches well, but Dodgers offense goes back to sleep in loss to Astros
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HOUSTON — Shohei Ohtani twisted his head to the right, even as his follow-through carried his body the other way down the mound.
He’d missed his spot, his fastball carrying up and in to Astros designated hitter Christian Walker, who lifted it onto the train tracks high over the left-field wall. Ohtani watched it fly.
Ohtani, not in the batting order Tuesday, wouldn’t get to combat the homer with his swing. So, all there was to do was buckle down and retire the side without further incident.
He did just that. But as the Dodgers fell to the Astros 2-1, the offense sunk back into a slump.
“The offense, including myself, hasn’t done a great job scoring runs,” Ohtani said through interpreter Will Ireton, after limiting the Astros to two runs through a season-high seven innings. “... If I was hitting well, I’m sure the team would want me to pitch and hit as well. But in a situation where, ‘Hey, just focus on pitching, turn the page on the hitting,’ I understand that the team might think like that.”
The Dodgers gave Ohtani a break from hitting Tuesday in the midst of a five-game hitless streak, marking his third pitching-only start of the season. But he isn’t the only Dodger in an offensive rut.
After an eight-run offensive performance Monday, the Dodgers offense tallied just six hits Tuesday and went one for eight with runners in scoring position.
The Dodgers have lost five of their last seven games, scoring two or fewer runs in each of those losses.
The Dodgers rediscovered their home run swing in an 8-3 win over the Houston Astros, but Shohei Ohtani wasn’t part of their resurgence at the plate.
“He’s doing his job,” shortstop Miguel Rojas said of Ohtani. “He’s pitching, he’s doing everything he can to help the team win. And we as an offense need to find ways to score runs for him. So it’s not because he’s not in the lineup that we’re not scoring runs. … We have plenty of hitters in this lineup that can get the job done.”
The fact that Ohtani’s pitching performance Tuesday included a series of unfortunate season-firsts underscored just how dominant he’d been on the mound to start the year.
The first two hits he gave up Tuesday were solo home runs to Walker and Braden Shewmake. They were the first homers he’d given up all season, both over the shallow left-field wall at Daikin Park, although Walker’s was on a 395-foot trajectory, according to Statcast.
For the first time in 2026, Ohtani surrendered multiple earned runs in a start. He’d won pitcher of the month honors for his 0.60 ERA through April.
On Tuesday, Ohtani didn’t allow multiple baserunners in an inning until the fifth, when Astros No. 8 hitter Nick Allen and Shewmake hit back-to-back two-out singles.
As he’s been known to do in pressure situations, Ohtani shifted into another gear, touching 101 mph en route to striking out Jose Altuve on an outside sweeper that finished in the opposite batter’s box as Altuve whiffed.
Ohtani cruised through the next two hitless innings.
“Unfortunately we couldn’t get him a win,” manager Dave Roberts said. “But he did a nice job of preserving the bullpen, going deep in the game and giving us a good chance to win tomorrow.”
The Dodgers offense showed signs of life with Freddie Freeman’s double off the left-field wall in the first inning, Andy Pages’ speed on the basepaths in the second, and the bottom half of the order loading the bases with two outs in the fourth, the Dodgers squandered each of those scoring opportunities.
The Dodgers’ offense has struggled over the last week, which is nothing this team hasn’t been through before. Last season, for example.
Finally in the eighth, Alex Call produced a pinch-hit double. And then former Astro Kyle Tucker, showered with boos as he stepped up to the plate, drove in the Dodgers’ first run of the game.
“It was just a collective tonight offensively,” Roberts said of his team’s scoring woes. “I thought there were some good things in there, some bad things as far as at-bat quality. But that happens with every team.”
Injury updates
Dodgers utility player Kiké Hernández (left elbow surgery recovery) started a rehab assignment with triple-A Oklahoma City on Tuesday. He went one for three with a ground-rule double and played five innings at third base.
Utility player Tommy Edman was initially on a timeline similar to Hernández, but Edman has been dealing with some “residual soreness,” according to Roberts.
“So we’ve kind of backed him off a little bit,” Roberts said. “But nothing too alarming. He’s just on a slower program.”
Shortstop Mookie Betts (strained right oblique) is scheduled to take live batting practice this week, Roberts said, and is expected to begin a minor-league rehab assignment “soon.”
Right-handed reliever Brock Stewart (right shoulder surgery recovery) joined the team in Houston, and Roberts said he could be activated before the end of the series.
