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- The Dodgers have helped an often-wobbly Roki Sasaki transform into a dominant force in the starting rotation.
- After a brutal spring and early-season struggles, Sasaki has delivered four consecutive strong starts, the latest coming in the Dodgers’ 6-2 win over Seattle on Thursday.
- Mechanical tweaks over the All-Star break, a larger glove and a surge of confidence have unlocked Sasaki’s “Monster of the Reiwa Era” form.
Long-term experiments demand resources, which is why the Dodgers’ lab is perfect for the Roki Sasaki project.
Funding is no issue. Time is no object. Pressure is a privilege and so is patience.
And when the Dodgers set out to prove a hypothesis — Roki Sasaki can be a “Cy Young-caliber” starting pitcher, as general manager Brandon Gomes has suggested — they did it with the luxury of seeing the project all the way through, until they’ve been proved right.
And most everyone else, wrong.
No, Sasaki didn’t need to be moved to the bullpen.
No, Sasaki didn’t need to be sent back down to the minor leagues.
No, Sasaki wasn’t going to be a bust.
Yes, the Dodgers knew exactly what they were doing by continuing to trot out the 24-year-old right-hander, providing him with the big-league education they promised.
Dodgers star Shohei Ohtani, who has been dealing with a left knee ailment, did not play in the team’s 6-2 win over the Seattle Mariners.
Thursday’s test ran 5⅓ innings, and Sasaki — with his bigger glove and harder splitter — held the Seattle Mariners at bay until the sixth inning, when they scored their only two runs in a game the Dodgers won 6-2.
For the fourth straight start, Sasaki performed like the pitcher who was promised when he picked the Dodgers 18 months ago, trusting them to develop him into a starting star.
Tack on another win to three consecutive he’d previously recorded, against the Colorado Rockies, New York Yankees and New York Mets.
In his past four starts, Sasaki (5-5) has struck out 26 batters, walked seven and has a 2.25 ERA and 3.44 FIP in 24 innings.
Man alive, the Dodgers have done it! “The Monster of the Reiwa Era” is breaking out. And the rest of baseball should probably be terrified.
“This is a tough league,” catcher Dalton Rushing said. “You have to have confidence and if you don’t have confidence, it’s hard to be successful. I think that’s all it was. He lacked a little bit of confidence early on. And as soon as he had that runway to kind of allow himself to be himself, you’ve seen the best out of him.”
Progress isn’t linear. But it’s been undeniable.
As a much-hyped rookie last season, Sasaki didn’t step right in as a permanent part of the Dodgers’ starting rotation. He had health issues and crises of confidence. And he had to acclimate to a culture far from his home in Japan, and to do it with his baseball-mad country following along closely.
All while playing under the Dodgers’ high-powered microscope. (Ask Kyle Tucker, a 29-year-old, English-speaking American, how challenging it’s been.)
Then, in the postseason, Sasaki became a not-so-secret secret weapon out of the bullpen in the Dodgers’ successful World Series defense. A step forward in relief, and then, as a sophomore starter, several steps back.
This spring training, Sasaki posted a 15.58 ERA and gave up 15 walks in 8⅔ innings. He looked lost — like, I thought, someone whose too-often dejected body language told us the glare of Dodger Stadium’s bright lights would do more damage than help.
I felt bad for the young man, felt he should get to fix his issues in the minors. I doubted his fortitude.
To start the regular season, Sasaki was shaky. He struggled with command. Failed to get out of the fifth inning in his first three starts. And the appeals began for the Dodgers to sign Sasaki up for duty in the ‘pen.
But the Dodgers (69-40) didn’t seem to consider it.
Why would they? They’re incentivized to see this trial all the way through, because of what it says about them as a developmental destination. As the club that pushes the right buttons. That can figure out how to help top talent figure it out.
A lower-half mechanical change over the All-Star break helped the 6-foot-2 Sasaki’s retooled splitter regain its movement and his fastball its heat; he hit or eclipsed 100 mph six times Thursday.
Also, a noticeably larger glove seems to have helped him curb his habit as an overly generous tipper. They thought he might have been inadvertently cluing in opponents with his movements on the mound — now they’ve found a way to better hide them, though neither Sasaki nor manager Dave Roberts want to credit the leather for this recent breakthrough.
“It’s not the glove,” Roberts said. “I think it’s just more of even the second half, when he came out that first start, you just saw that I think he just kind of decided that it’s time to go and finish strong. It’s a new half, it’s a new beginning. And you’ve seen a different player, you know, to be quite honest.
“There’s a lot more confidence ... I use that word ‘conviction’ a lot, and there’s a lot of conviction.”
Because it’s not the size of a glove on a man, right? It’s his heart.
