shohei ohtani

Shohei Ohtani was out of the lineup Thursday and his availability is a “day-to-day situation,” manager Dave Roberts announced before the Dodgers’ series finale against the St. Louis Cardinals.

The area around Ohtani’s right biceps and neck was bothering him during the Dodgers’ loss Wednesday, Roberts said.

“It just wasn’t firing the way he wanted it to,” Roberts said. “That’s why I think you saw some grimacing and some kind of shaking of the arm just trying to get it to fire and he couldn’t do that.”

Ohtani was not made available to talk before the game, and he declined requests for comment twice during the Dodgers’ road series in Detroit this past weekend. He last spoke to reporters on Aug. 17.

Ohtani’s health has been scrutinized for much of the season and even more over the last week. He hasn’t pitched since July 3 because of soreness and threw a bullpen session last Friday in hopes of pitching one inning Sunday against the Detroit Tigers. But, not feeling “100%,” as Roberts put it, Ohtani didn’t return to the mound, and his throwing progression stalled.

Though Roberts described Ohtani’s ailment as an overall issue, including his left knee and right biceps, he remained in the lineup. Roberts said then that he’d been given no indication that swinging the bat was affecting Ohtani, but if that changed, the manager would have no problem with sitting the superstar.

Wednesday, as Ohtani went 0 for 4 in the midst of a two-for-23 skid, his body language sounded alarm bells.

“I saw the same thing that everyone saw,” Roberts said after the Dodgers’ 8-6 loss to the Cardinals. “I saw the shaking of the arm, I saw the wincing, and clearly the swings aren’t who he is. And so, obviously, there’s some compensation. So I’m going to talk to him, and then I’ll make a decision about his availability.”

Roberts said a stint on the injured list was unlikely “but not impossible.”

“Ideally, he takes it as a mental and physical day,” Roberts said. “And then it’s just getting together with him later [Thursday] and seeing how the day is and how [he responds to] the day of rest. … At that point in time, we can make a decision as far as [Friday].”

Managing Ohtani’s health will continue to be a priority for the Dodgers. He’s been dealing with lingering knee soreness and inflammation since at least mid-June, and his biceps issue has flared several times this season.

Ohtani’s buildup back to pitching has been halted twice since he received an Orthovisc injection to lubricate the knee joint over the All-Star break.

As valuable as Ohtani is to the Dodgers as a pitcher, his offensive impact is needed far more, especially with left-hander Tarik Skubal added to the rotation. If continuing to try to pitch jeopardizes Ohtani’s production with his bat, it may be in the team’s best interest to take pitching off the table for him.

Tommy Edman was penciled into the leadoff spot and will play center field, while Alex Call will be the designated hitter and bat eighth.

DETROIT — Shohei Ohtani is not feeling “100%,” manager Dave Roberts revealed before the Dodgers game against the Tigers on Saturday. And that will be at the center of the team’s conversation about whether to start him Sunday.

It would be Ohtani’s first pitching start since July 3. He’s been just serving as the designated hitter in the meantime, while managing lingering inflammation and soreness in his left knee, primarily aggravated by pitching. But it’s not just his knee that’s ailing him, Roberts said after talking to the Dodgers training staff. His biceps issue from earlier in the year is part of the concern as well.

Ohtani threw a 20-pitch bullpen — shorter than his customary between-starts session — on Friday to tentatively set him up to throw the first inning Sunday.

“The knee, the body, just throwing, pitching, not 100%,” Roberts said. “What percent it is, I don’t know the answer.”

Roberts said he wanted to have clarity after the game Saturday, so he could notify Tigers manager A.J. Hinch and right-hander Tyler Glasnow, who is set to pitch Sunday either way. If Ohtani pitches Sunday, it would be opening for Glasnow.

“I’m not going to ambush those guys, and I’m not going to ambush Glas,” Roberts said. “So I think I would say that after the game, we’ll know definitively.”

If Ohtani doesn’t pitch Sunday, Tuesday, likely before left-hander Eric Lauer, could in theory be an option. But if Ohtani doesn’t feel good enough to start Sunday, two extra days of rest probably aren’t to resolve the issue, making a longer leadup more likely.

“We’re still thinking about potentially the buildup and what that would mean, which is fair,” Roberts said. “But at the end of the day, it’s what’s best for Shohei, what’s best for us, what makes the most sense. That’s kind of where we’re at.”

The longer it takes for Ohtani to return to the mound, the fewer starts he’ll have to build up before the postseason.

“I wouldn’t bet against Shohei,” Roberts said. “But I still think that five innings to the end of the season is aggressive for anyone.”

Though Roberts said the question is more “when,” rather than “if,” Ohtani will return to the mound, the fact that Ohtani’s knee issue (and apparently biceps as well) has not yet resolved calls into question whether it makes sense for him to resume two-way duties this late in the year.

“To be quite frank, I just don’t see everything getting to 100% by the end of the season,” Roberts said. “But there’s a lot of pitchers that are not 100% and still viable. So again, it’s just not an exact science.”

If that holds true, the concern is twofold: both how Ohtani’s health could affect his performance on the mound and at the plate.

“Obviously, where we’re at right now with the pitching, the starting pitching certainly being a strength, his value offensively is hugely important, and so we can’t compromise that in any fashion,” Roberts said. “So, if throwing potentially cuts into that, that’s not worth the squeeze. So that’s something, for me, I’m very bullish on making sure we don’t compromise the hitting.”

Ohtani entered Saturday with a .218 batting average since Aug. 8, when he resumed playing catch. But Roberts pushed back on the impulse to draw a line between Ohtani’s recent offensive dip and his side work on the pitching side.

“It just hasn’t been a whole body of work on the throwing side,” Roberts said. “Honestly, for me, I think the pitch selection hasn’t been good.”

Regardless of Ohtani’s status for Sunday, the superstar’s feedback will continue to play a large role in the Dodgers’ decision-making.

“I think that as the competitor, he wants to do both, and I respect it,” Roberts said. “But nothing I’m saying changes his identity as a two-way player.

“I think in the moment, he still feels that there’s still an opportunity, and I’m not trying to say there isn’t. But I do think that at the end of the day, he’s very aware of our roster, strengths, weaknesses, and his value to the ball club, and whatever that means.”

DETROIT — Dodgers two-way player Shohei Ohtani threw a bullpen Friday at Comerica Park before the team opened a three-game series against the Tigers, as scheduled. But it was not immediately clear if it put him in line to start Sunday.

“I really don’t know what to make of it because I didn’t put eyes on it,” manager Dave Roberts said before the game. “Obviously I’ve got to talk to Shohei, talk to [pitching coach Mark Prior] and then we’ll make a decision for Sunday. But again I have to have that conversation.”

Ohtani threw about 20 pitches in the side session, which Roberts noted was “short,” but he said he hadn’t had any expectations for pitch counts.

Ohtani’s between-start side sessions are usually closer to 30 pitches, but that alone isn’t necessarily a reason to sound the alarm, especially without a clearer picture of the initial plan for Friday’s session. The Dodgers will continue to monitor Ohtani’s recovery as well.

Ohtani had last thrown off the mound six days prior, in a live batting practice session last Saturday.

If he does start Sunday, it will likely be one inning in front of right-hander Tyler Glasnow, Roberts said.

Ohtani hasn’t pitched in a game since July 3 against the Padres, managing swelling and discomfort in his left knee.

Barring a setback, the schedule allows for Ohtani to make five starts on at least five days’ rest before the end of the season.

Glasnow, who threw five innings and 89 pitches on Tuesday in his first start back from the injured list, is scheduled to start on regular rest Sunday.

“Glas felt good going on regular,” Roberts said when asked why the Dodgers didn’t push his start to Tuesday, “and also looking at the calendar and where other guys line up.”

Those who were at Dodger Stadium on a gorgeous Friday night seemed to be in for an all-nighter.

They have Tommy Edman to thank for getting home a bit earlier.

With two outs in the 10th, Kiké Hernández on third and Kyle Tucker on first, the second baseman hit a walk-off single against Pittsburgh Pirates reliever Gregory Soto, earning the Dodgers a 5-4 win.

“Yeah, it feels great,” Edman said. “We’ve kind of been struggling a little bit in those clutch situations, myself included, so it felt really good to come through.”

Edman entered the at-bat 0 for 3 and was seemingly on the verge of keeping the 200-minute game alive in an unfavorable way.

Soto, however, threw the same low-middle sweeper that Edman fouled off one pitch earlier, and the second baseman jumped on it the second time around, propelling the Dodgers (78-51) to four consecutive wins for the first time since late July.

“That’s something I really try to take pride in — leaving past at-bats behind me — and I think I’ve done a good job of that this year,” Edman said. “I think that’s something we do really well overall as a group, and that leads to coming through in big situations like that, putting past at-bats behind you.

“One of the best feelings after grinding for 10 innings,” he added. “We had a bunch of pitchers do a really good job today.”

However, the victory was tempered by the loss of center fielder Andy Pages, who was struck in the left hand with a Bubba Chandler pitch in the third inning. Manager Dave Roberts said X-rays showed a fracture and Pages is expected to be out at least four weeks.

Yoshinobu Yamamoto helped make sure the loss of Pages was not in vain.

The right-hander brought the urgency to the mound that the Dodgers were missing during an abysmal 5-11 stretch that ended with a sweep against the Colorado Rockies this week.

“I personally felt like today’s game is very important,” Yamamoto said. “We’re gonna have [Tarik] Skubal starting [Saturday], and I just wanted to maintain the momentum, which started in Colorado.”

Yamamoto surrendered two runs — both via singles from Pirates designated hitter Nick Gonzales — on five hits over 6⅓ innings, striking out nine and walking one.

“My stuff was pretty good today,” Yamamoto said. “I was feeling pretty good out there. So even after letting runners on the bases, I just tried to focus and then take it one hitter at a time.”

Chandler, meanwhile, exited after four innings. Max Muncy hit a two-run homer in the first, and Mookie Betts contributed a two-run single in the third.

The Dodgers, with a 4-2 lead, cruised into the eighth. But Kyle Hurt gave up a tying two-run homer to Oneil Cruz.

Dodgers pitcher Yoshinobu Yamamoto delivers against the Pittsburgh Pirates in the second inning Friday night.

(Gina Ferazzi / Los Angeles Times)

Matters looked grim for the Dodgers in the 10th when Evan Phillips found himself in a one-out, bases-loaded jam.

All was well, though, once Phillips got Henry Davis to ground into an inning-ending, 6-4-3 double play.

“That was great,” Roberts said of Phillips. “I know that he’s trying to kind of build as we’re going through this, and [it] hasn’t been smooth sailing for him and the success that he’s used to. But this is a big one. Big confidence builder for him … to strand those two runners was a big outing for him.”

Edman took care of the rest.

And for maybe the first time in weeks, the Dodgers appear to be inching back to their champion ways.

“I think our guys are kind of reinterested, you know, collectively,” Roberts said before the game. “So, that’s a good thing.”

Andy Pages sustains hand fracture

Dodgers center fielder Andy Pages gets hit by a pitch during the third inning against the Pirates on Friday night.

(Gina Ferazzi / Los Angeles Times)

Roberts said Pages sustained a fracture on the back of his left hand when he was hit by the 100-mph pitch It’s unclear if he will need surgery.

“Well, it’s just really unfortunate, obviously,” Roberts said. “It’s not season-ending. … So, I would expect him back, knowing him, on the earlier side. … I feel for him because he’s having such a good year.”

Roberts said Edman is an option to fill in for Pages in center field.

In a more positive development, Will Smith faced live pitching for the first time since June, and Roberts said that the plan is to activate the catcher during the first week of September.

“Today was a good day for Will,” Roberts said. “Taking at-bats. He’ll catch a couple bullpens today. He’ll do a couple more lives. … He still needs to get his legs back under him before we feel confident that he can take down a major league game and feel good coming out of it.”

Roberts added that Smith is “gonna play in the postseason” and that there is enough time for him to reach 100% strength.

Tyler Glasnow will likely be activated during the Dodgers’ upcoming trip to Atlanta.

“I just saw him. He had a great outing — his last rehab outing,” Roberts said. “I’m not sure which day we’re gonna pencil him in against the Braves, but if all of the things check out, it’ll be that [series].”

Ohtani will return to the mound at some point this season.

“It’s gonna happen,” Roberts said. “[Ohtani] threw another bullpen. … I think that there’s going to be a live or two, and then he’ll be on the mound. I just don’t know when we’re going to do that with the scheduling.”

Dalton Rushing is “pain-free” and close to facing live pitching, according to Roberts, but the catcher is “unlikely” to return to catching this season.

“I hope I’m wrong,” Roberts said. “But he’s determined to go through the process, the progression, the build-up and get back. And we’ll see where we’re at.”

Roberts didn’t rule out the possibility of Rushing being activated as a designated hitter down the line.

The Dodgers just can’t have some peace and calm, can they? Now, an owner is getting in on the fun with some controversy.

DENVER — Shohei Ohtani paused to admire the flight of his no-doubt home run as it sailed to right-center field.

Clearly on a home-run trajectory, it was headed toward the visitor’s bullpen. From among the trees, Dodgers reliever Kyle Hurt’s glove shot up and secured the ball.

As Ohtani circled the bases, the bullpen turned into a mosh pit around Hurt.

In what has been a brutal August for the Dodgers, the vibes were undeniably high.

Maybe all the Dodgers needed was a trip to the Mile High City.

En route to an 11-5 win over the Rockies, Ohtani’s two-run blast in the sixth inning — his second homer of the game — widened the Dodgers’ lead to eight runs, a comfortable lead even at hitter-friendly Coors Field.

“Consistency is key, but today I think we should [come] away with a lot of big confidence,” said Ohtani, through interpreter Will Ireton, after his four-hit performance. “Doing this every day is what matters, but I think this is a big game for us.”

Even with Monday’s win, the Dodgers have a 6-10 record in August. And they entered Monday with a paltry .672 OPS, on pace for their worst offensive month of the season. For comparison, it posted a .710 OPS in July — its worst complete month.

There are plenty of asterisks to put on Monday’s victory. The altitude in Denver elevates any offense. And the Rockies have the worst record (50-75) in the National League.

Maybe what the Dodgers (75-51) needed most — after dropping three of four to the Brewers at Dodger Stadium and handing over the season series (and tiebreaker if it comes down to that) — was a lighter series to loosen them up.

“I think it kind of gets to what makes you good as an offense,” manager Dave Roberts said, “and that’s what makes us good: earning pitches, winning counts, spoiling pitches, those kinds of things.”

It was already working by the second inning when Max Muncy scored from first on Mookie Betts’ double into the left-center gap of the expansive Coors Field outfield.

The next inning, Ohtani, Freddie Freeman and Andy Pages singled one after another for a second run.

Then Muncy, after falling behind 0-2 and then working an eight-pitch at-bat, demolished a sinker that Rockies starter Tomoyuki Sugano left over the center of the plate, giving it a ride to the second deck in right-center.

“That’s who we are,” Roberts said. “That’s what we’ve been searching for for quite some time. And today, I thought the at-bat that really kind of encapsulates who we are is the Muncy at-bat.”

It was Muncy’s third home run in five games, and they’ve all been momentum-swingers. His pinch-hit home run Thursday gave the Dodgers the lead over the Brewers — before Edwin Díaz’s blown save. On Sunday, his solo shot temporarily tied the score before the Dodgers’ loss.

On Monday, his three-run blast put the Dodgers up 5-0 in the third.

Dodgers starting pitcher Blake Snell delivers against the Colorado Rockies in the second inning Monday.

(David Zalubowski / Associated Press)

Dodgers starter Blake Snell, who held the Rockies to one run and two hits in six innings, dominated the first two innings. Even with the altitude affecting the shape of his pitches, he was getting whiffs on his curveball. And he paired it with his four-seamer (and threw just one changeup) to retire six straight batters.

Then in the third, he temporarily lost command. Snell walked three straight, throwing 21 pitches. Snell got Rockies leadoff hitter Jake McCarthy to ground into a fielder’s choice, but it pushed a run across. But Snell avoided further damage by inducing Jordan Beck to fly out and Cole Carrigg to strike out.

He threw three straight curveballs to Carrigg, bouncing the first and last in the dirt, and Carrigg swung at all three.

Getting back on track, Snell navigated around a pair of singles in the fourth inning, before retiring the Rockies in order in the fifth and sixth.

“Certainly altitude kind of can play tricks on your stuff,” Roberts said. “But if there’s conviction behind your throw, you can still get major-league hitters out. And he proved that tonight.”

Meanwhile, the Dodgers added two more insurance runs in the fifth with a solo homer from Ohtani, a double from Pages and a couple of defensive bobbles by the Rockies.

Ohtani’s two-run homer in the next inning, followed soon after by an RBI single from Pages, made the Dodgers’ lead insurmountable.

The Rockies got one back in the seventh, with some help from Dodgers right fielder Kyle Tucker, who dropped a flyball. Then in the eighth, the Dodgers took advantage of an error by Carrigg in center field that allowed Ohtani to advance to second. Freeman drove him in with a double.

With an 11-2 lead, the Dodgers sent Díaz, who hadn’t pitched since Friday, to the mound for the ninth. Still working through delivery problems, he gave up four hits, three runs and hit a batter.

“Obviously the results weren’t good,” Roberts said. “But I still think that him getting out there, pitching major-league innings, is going to help him. So yeah, we’re still working through some things.”

Ohtani scheduled to throw

Ohtani said he’ll throw a bullpen session Tuesday, “assuming everything feels good.” It will be his third bullpen since receiving an Orthovisc injection in his left knee at the beginning of the All-Star break to lubricate the joint, but his second since restarting his throwing program. He last threw Friday, in a 34-pitch session.

“It’s nice to feel the progress on the pitching side,” Ohtani said. “And it just feels better, just going into the game as a hitter, less to focus, less to worry about.”

He said the hope is that he has gotten through the worst of his knee problem and won’t have any more setbacks.

“That’s the reason why we’ve been pretty careful in the rehab process,” he said, “and that’s the ideal outcome, to make sure that I come back as soon as possible.”

Dodgers star Shohei Ohtani took the bullpen mound at Dodger Stadium, with president of baseball operations Andrew Friedman and pitching coach Mark Prior looking on, and began his first bullpen throwing session in more than three weeks.

Friday marked an important step in Ohtani’s throwing progression. He threw 34 pitches before the Dodgers’ game against the Milwaukee Brewers, appearing to mix in different pitch types.

Although Ohtani hasn’t landed on the injured list for lingering inflammation and soreness in his left knee, he hasn’t pitched in a game since July 3.

After Ohtani received a lubricating Orthovisc injection in his knee at the beginning of the All-Star break, the Dodgers hoped he would pitch against the Philadelphia Phillies on July 22. But as they monitored his response, it became clear he wasn’t going to be ready.

Instead, Ohtani threw a 31-pitch bullpen. But his recovery regressed, and he was shut down from throwing.

“At the end of the day, he wants to be healthy,” manager Dave Roberts said earlier this week. “He wants to be there in the postseason. I think that did check him up. If you look at how we kind of paused things — we all want to be smart and careful. I’m happy that we’ve done that with him.”

Ohtani restarted catch play on Aug. 7. And after playing catch three more days this week, Ohtani and the Dodgers determined he was ready to throw off the mound again.

“Rather than rush the progression of this I would rather make sure we’re headed in the right direction,” Ohtani said last week. “Making sure we’re taking the right steps.”

Ohtani is expected to go through a bullpen progression and then advance to throwing live batting practice — although Roberts said earlier this week he didn’t know how many of each he’d need before returning.

Because the Dodgers want to keep Ohtani in the lineup, he’ll have to build up in games rather than going on a minor-league rehab assignment.

Ohtani did something similar last season, but then, he was returning to the mound for the first time since 2023 elbow surgery.

“Having kind of done that — an inning here, an inning there and then you sort of build up during the season, absolutely,” said Roberts when asked if 2025 could serve as a blueprint. “And I think he’s seen what that buildup can lead to and how it looks. I certainly feel that he’ll buy in.”

Injury updates

Catchers Will Smith (neck) and Dalton Rushing (elbow) each took steps in their hitting progressions. Both took batting practice before the game.

Smith has been out since early June. Rushing landed on the IL on Aug. 3.

In 2012, on the day after Mark Walter and his partners bought the Dodgers, I sat next to Walter in a conference room. To the sports fan, Walter was virtually anonymous: a super rich guy who had made his money running investment and insurance companies.

Walter’s purchase valued the Dodgers and its related assets at a then-record $2.15 billion. That value stunned the sports world. Mark Cuban had bowed out of the bidding, believing the Dodgers were not worth even $1 billion.

I asked Walter why he believed it made business sense to pay three times as much as any major league team had sold for.

“I think you have a few moments in life where you have the opportunity to own an asset and really be a custodian of something that should be multigenerational and iconic,” he said then. “I understand it’s a lot of money. But it’s not as if you can go buy another one tomorrow. … We hope we never, ever are going to sell it.”

That was essentially the point that someone who travels within the inner circles of pro sports made to me Wednesday morning, as news broke that Walter had sold the Lakers to Bob Iger, the former Disney chief, and Joshua Kushner.

The Steinbrenner family has owned the New York Yankees for 53 years. Jerry Jones has owned the Dallas Cowboys for 37 years. The Buss family owned the Lakers for 46 years.

These trophy assets are few and far between. Walter had agreed to sell the Lakers after less than one year of ownership — and not through a comprehensive bidding process, but to an inquiring caller during the weekend?

“This has more red flags than a May Day parade,” an industry insider said, speaking on condition of anonymity so as not to jeopardize his professional relationships.

The deal, which valued the Lakers at $12.5 billion, was motivated by the spiraling price for an NBA expansion team in Las Vegas, according to ESPN’s Ramona Shelburne. After all, if Iger and Kushner might have to pay $10 billion for a startup team, why not call and see if Walter might accept a bit more for one of the marquee franchises in American sports?

Was this a blind call or was Walter looking to sell?

“It was suggested to us that maybe Mark Walter would be interested in selling his stake in the Lakers,” Iger told the California Post.

What did Dodgers president Stan Kasten have to say about that?

“I never knew that. He never said that to me,” Kasten said. “I think he was surprised by it. That’s what he has expressed to me. Mark had no plan to do this. This just came up, and he thought about it and said yes.”

Why might Walter have been interested in selling?

Mark Walter acknowledges a fan before a game against the Cubs in Chicago this month.

(Melissa Tamez / Associated Press)

Only he can say for sure, but his companies are under federal investigation for failing to disclose and properly account for billions of dollars of loans among related entities. Bloomberg reported Wednesday that Walter’s holding company is trying to raise money that could help pay off or at least pay down those loans, and the Financial Times reported that company assets could be sold or restructured.

No charges have been filed, and investigations can conclude without charges. No allegations of wrongdoing have been made against Walter.

Is there a baseball angle to this?

Among the investment firms Walter’s holding company approached about “deals to raise cash,” according to Bloomberg: the asset management firm owned by New York Mets owner Steve Cohen.

Cohen’s firm passed, according to the Financial Times.

When Walter and his partners bought the Dodgers, the runners-up: the bid team of Cohen and Los Angeles Times owner Patrick Soon-Shiong.

“No, that never came up. And Mark and I discussed it,” Kasten said. “So, no, we don’t have any reason to think that. I certainly have no reason to think that.”

What does Walter’s sale of the Lakers mean for the Dodgers?

“It means nothing for the Dodgers,” someone who speaks regularly with Walter said, speaking on condition of anonymity. “He owned them long before the Lakers and will own them long after.”

If Walter should later sell the Dodgers, what might have the greatest impact on the team?

Shohei Ohtani has an out clause in his contract if Mark Walter sells the team.

(Eric Thayer / Los Angeles Times)

Shohei Ohtani’s 10-year, $700-million contract with the Dodgers includes an unusual escape clause: If Walter is no longer the controlling owner, or if Andrew Friedman is no longer running the Dodgers’ baseball operations department, Ohtani can opt out of the contract.

Would he?

Way too soon to tell. If major league owners get their way in collective bargaining, the proposed salary cap would mean Ohtani at $70 million could eat up just about one-third of any team’s payroll. And, in his third year with the Dodgers, he has yet to complete a full season as a pitcher, and a left knee in which manager Dave Roberts says Ohtani suffers from “wear and tear” could make him less of a two-way player as the contract winds down.

On the other hand, playing salary might be less of an issue for him than for any other player in baseball. Ohtani is making more than his annual salary from sponsorships and endorsements — an estimated $125 million this year — and he famously deferred $68 million of each year’s salary so the Dodgers could spend more freely on players that could help him and the team win. After six losing years with the Angels and two World Series championships in two years with the Dodgers, a losing team might not entice Ohtani, no matter how much room it might have under a proposed cap.

Iger used to run Disney. How did Disney’s experience owning the Angels and Mighty Ducks go?

Disney chairman Michael Eisner, left, NHL commissioner Gary Bettman, NHL chairman Bruce McNall and Mighty Ducks chairman Jack Lindquist blow duck calls announcing the name of the team in 1993.

(Doug Pizac / Associated Press)

Disney dressed the Angels in uniforms derided by one player as “pinstripe pajamas,” put cheerleaders on the dugout roof and installed a loud “countdown to first pitch.” This all seemed awful at the time but, given the plagues of in-game hosts and teams sporting jerseys in colors far beyond home white and road gray, perhaps Disney was just ahead of its time. And, for the first few years of the franchise, Mighty Ducks gear was some of the hottest merchandise in American sports.

Ultimately, Disney wanted the Angels and Mighty Ducks to launch an “ESPN West” regional sports channel. When that channel collapsed, Disney no longer needed the teams and eventually sold them. The Angels were such a minimal part of Disney’s portfolio that then-chief executive Michael Eisner showed up in the clubhouse and the players had no idea who he was.

Who owned the Angels when they won their only World Series championship?

Angels players wave to fans during the World Series title parade in Anaheim in 2002.

(Jean-Marc Bouju / Associated Press)

Disney. The company hired an investment banker to sell the team in the final month before the Angels won the 2002 World Series and agreed to sell to Arte Moreno in the first month of the following season.

One more try: Why did Walter really sell the Lakers?

“I think it was opportunistic and he found something that made sense to him,” Kasten said. “Mark’s a very sensible guy. But that’s really the only way I can explain it.

“You’ll have to talk to Mark about a more in-depth explanation, and good luck.”

Times staff writer Maddie Lee contributed to this report.

Tarik Skubal made his home debut Monday, but the down-on-their-luck Dodgers still needed every bit of offense they could muster to back him up.

They held off Kansas City 6-5, salvaging the Dodger Stadium introduction of baseball’s premier trade-deadline acquisition.

Skubal, the back-to-back Cy Young Award winner, pitched five innings, giving up four hits and three runs. He struck out six.

It was a solid outing, but the Dodgers needed their slumbering bats to come alive too.

Max Muncy had a bases-loaded triple in the sixth to give the Dodgers a 5-3 advantage, their first lead of the game.

But the Royals answered in the seventh with a two-run homer by Kyle Isbel, forging a 5-5 tie.

In the bottom of the seventh, Freddie Freeman put the home team up for good, hitting a single to right that drove in Shohei Ohtani.

Impossible to know if the win marked a turnaround or simply a tourniquet for the Dodgers, who entered having lost eight of nine, including sweeps by Boston and the Chicago Cubs. They had lost seven in a row before finally winning Saturday at Arizona, then resuming the slide Sunday with a loss to the Diamondbacks.

On the flight home, manager Dave Roberts had a jarring realization.

“We’re a wild-card team right now,” he said. “We’ve got to get going and play with urgency.”

The Dodgers had 10 hits, a welcome development for a team that has had a terrible time seeing and reacting to pitches — and particularly fastballs.

The Athletic crunched the numbers and found no team in baseball has had as dramatic an increase in fastball percentage, with the Dodgers seeing that number climb steadily since May.

“It never feels good to be bullied,” Roberts said. “And to know that teams go after us with the fastball more than any team in baseball, that’s bothersome. That would bother me. … We’ve scored a lot of runs — fourth in baseball — but that doesn’t tell the whole story. The story is being the best version of ourselves, and that’s hitting the fastball and making adjustments in at-bats, situationally, all of it.

“So yeah, it’s something that I hope our guys will take that personally. We shouldn’t get bullied.”

By the fifth inning, the Dodgers were out of ABS challenges, with Miguel Rojas tapping his helmet to check on a called strike that was, well, squarely in the strike zone.

That came after an unsuccessful challenge by Andy Pages in the fourth, and his track record on those inquiries is grim. Thirteen of his 24 challenges were confirmed strikes.

Kansas City’s Jac Caglianone had 20/20 vision, with a pair of two-strike hits that gave the Royals a 3-0 advantage. The first was a low-velocity groundball threaded up the middle to drive in a run. In the third, he hit a two-run shot over the right-field wall.

It wasn’t until the fifth that Skubal finally punctuated “Jac” with a K.

By that point, the Dodgers had clawed their way back to 3-2, driving in runs with clutch hits by Ohtani and Freeman that got the crowd buzzing again.

Tuesday marks the return of Blake Snell, who underwent left elbow surgery and hasn’t pitched for the Dodgers since May 9. That’s back-to-back nights featuring multiple Cy Young Award winners.

Roberts said he would like to see Snell throw five innings, roughly 75-80 pitches, in his return.

“I feel very confident,” Roberts said when asked about Snell getting back up to speed. “I had a great conversation with him yesterday. He’s on a mission, and I like when great-talent players have that mindset.”

Likewise, Roberts said catcher Will Smith, recovering from an inflamed disc in his neck, is “pain free” and on track for an imminent return.

“He’s been throwing, the weight-room stuff each day,” he said. “It’s been better, so this is going to be a big week for Will. And my expectation is that he should be taking some pitching, some coaches’ batting practice at some point this week.”

PHOENIX — Dodgers reliever Jack Dreyer let loose a shout, balling his hands into fists as he released the tension of the last several minutes — or, from a team perspective, over a week.

The Dodgers had just pulled off a 2-1 win against the Diamondbacks in the 10th inning, and, mercifully, snapped a seven-game losing streak. It was their longest such streak since July 2025. They haven’t had a losing streak longer than seven games since September 2017 (11).

“I think that was the most emotion I’ve ever showed,” said Dreyer, who picked up his first save of the season. “It was nice because I knew I wouldn’t go back out for the next inning. … The game was over. So kind of let the emotions take over for a little bit.”

Before this latest streak, the Dodgers had done an admirable job of not piling up losses. They hadn’t lost more than four straight games until this week. But the Dodgers were swept in two straight series, against the Boston Red Sox and the Chicago Cubs heading into the weekend against Arizona (62-56).

The Dodgers’ National League West lead over the second-place Diamondbacks moved up to 8½ games.

Many of the Dodgers’ recent problems still flared. The offense is slumping, and the back end of the bullpen has been shaky. But at least the streak was finally over.

“Man, that was a tough one,” manager Dave Roberts said. “We’ll take it.”

The Dodgers’ offense has been all but silenced in two games against Arizona. A day after Merrill Kelly kept the Dodgers hitless through his first five innings, Arizona starter Brandon Pfaadt gave up only a pair of infield hits to Andy Pages through seven innings.

“I think each individual, there’s a different component,” Roberts said. “But I think collectively, we just gotta come together. We’re just better than this. As we always say, it’s not a try league. We gotta get it done. We gotta be better, and again, to score one or two runs to win, it’s just a hard quality of life. I understand hitting is hard. I did it, but we’ve got a lot of talent in the room.”

Dodgers starter Yoshinobu Yamamoto was nearly as effective, holding the Diamondbacks to three hits. But he wasn’t as efficient and exited with two outs in the sixth inning, his pitch count up to 107.

The game remained scoreless until Kyle Tucker, whose bat has been hot this road trip, hit a solo home run to right field off Diamondbacks reliever Jonathan Loáisiga in the eighth.

Teoscar Hernández and Hunter Feduccia followed with singles, but both were left stranded when Shohei Ohtani and Pages struck out.

Dodgers reliever Kyle Hurt retired the first two batters in the eighth before giving up a single and back-to-back walks to load the bases. Tanner Scott replaced him and got out of the jam by inducing Waldschmidt to fly out.

In the ninth, Díaz, who gave up a walk-off home run Friday, blew it again, but he at least managed to keep the score tied.

Díaz gave up back-to-back triples to Geraldo Perdomo and Corbin Carroll to tie the score. He retired three of the next four batters, with an intentional walk in between, to send the game into extra innings.

“You saw once they scored the run, man on third base, nobody out, you saw the intensity pick up, the stuff picked up,” Roberts said. “The fastball got better. The slider got better. Even talking to him after the game, that’s how we have to be from the first pitch. That was the first game I saw this year where he had some real intensity.”

Tucker served as the Dodgers’ automatic runner on second base to start the 10th inning, and with two outs, he advanced to third base on a wild pitch, as Feduccia took first on a walk.

That put runners on the corners for Ohtani. He hit a sharp groundball to the right of Diamondbacks first baseman Tim Tawa, who made a diving stop. But the ball rolled away from him as he went to flip to first, giving Ohtani time to reach first and Tucker time to score the go-ahead run.

“I guess that was the game right there,” Tucker said. “So it was a great at-bat out of him and being able to get down the line was huge.”

Clinging to a narrow lead, the Dodgers turned to Dreyer. He struck out Tawa. And then he got James McCann to hit a soft grounder up the middle, but McCann beat second baseman Tommy Edman’s throw to first by a split second.

With runners on the corners, Waldschmidt hit a bouncing comebacker that Dreyer snagged and threw to second before Edman quickly threw to Freddie Freeman to end the game.

“It helps when you have some of the best defensive players in the game behind you,” Dreyer said. “I knew that all I needed to do was get the ball to Tommy and he would take care of the rest. I don’t know if I had too much velo on the throw to him, but once it got to him, he made the play.

“That was fun to watch.”

Dodgers star Shohei Ohtani hits an RBI single in the 10th inning against the Diamondbacks on Saturday.

(Rick Scuteri / Associated Press)

Ohtani plays catch

Fans consolidated in the right field stands as Ohtani warmed up by throwing a weighted plyo ball against the back wall of the visitor’s bullpen and then returned to the outfield to play catch.

It was the first time Ohtani, who threw on flat ground from about 90 feet, has been spotted playing catch before a game since July 22, when he threw a 31-pitch bullpen in Philadelphia. According to the team, he has been keeping his arm moving with plyo ball drills.

Ohtani declined to comment through a team representative.

“It’s sort of Shohei and the training staff driving it, more Shohei,” Roberts said of Ohtani’s throwing schedule. “So I don’t know if he’s going to come back out there [Sunday] and pick up a baseball, or if it’s going to be Monday, but I do think that him getting out there and playing catch is a step in the right direction.”

PHOENIX — Dodgers closer Edwin Díaz trudged toward the dugout as Arizona’s Ryan Waldschmidt celebrated with teammates after hitting a two-run, walk-off home run to seal a 4-3 win that sent the Dodgers to a season-worst seventh straight loss.

“We’ve just got to play better,” manager Dave Roberts said before the game. “I don’t think that the standings — obviously, they are important, they matter. But I just feel like with the talent that we have, we just got to play good baseball, and it’ll take care of itself. It always does.”

The Dodgers’ recent skid dropped their National League West lead into single digits for the first time in over a month. They are now only 7½ games ahead of the second-place Diamondbacks in the division.

They also now have the fourth-best record in the majors (69-47), falling behind the Brewers (72-44) and Braves (70-46) and Rays (69-46).

“A week ago, it looked a lot different,” Roberts said. “And another week from now, it could look even more different. So you’ve just got to put your head down and play baseball.”

They did, at least, have a better record than last season (67-49) at the 116-game mark. But the Dodgers would prefer to, unlike last year, at least earn a first-round bye, and ideally home-field advantage throughout the playoffs.

Their performance Friday sent them in the wrong direction.

The Dodgers went hitless against Diamondbacks starting pitcher Merrill Kelly for the first five innings. Kyle Tucker and Shohei Ohtani both drew walks, as the Dodgers’ only baserunners before the sixth — and Ohtani was thrown out attempting to steal second to end the third inning.

Finally, leading off the sixth, Tommy Edman — who three innings prior was robbed of a home run on a leaping grab by Diamondbacks right fielder Corbin Carroll — broke up Kelly’s no-hit bid with a sharp infield hit.

Kelly picked off Edman at first base, but Hunter Feduccia followed with a single of his own, the catcher’s first hit since rejoining the Dodgers at the trade deadline.

Ohtani and Andy Pages both drew walks to load the bases. And the Dodgers finally scored on a groundball fielder’s choice from Freddie Freeman. That single run was all they got out of the inning.

Dodgers starting pitcher Roki Sasaki held the Diamondbacks to two runs in six innings. He surrendered a solo homer to Arizona third baseman Nolan Arenado in the second and an RBI triple to Geraldo Perdomo in the fifth. But he only gave up two other hits.

With both starters out by the seventh (Kelly exited with two outs in the sixth because of cramping in his right leg), the Dodgers orchestrated a comeback and then gave it up.

Edman drove in the tying run, too, lining a single to left for the Dodgers’ third hit of the inning off Diamondbacks right-hander Taylor Clarke in the seventh. But the Dodgers failed to turn a bases-loaded situation into a crooked number when Ohtani grounded into a double play to end the inning.

The next inning, Pages gave the Dodgers the lead with a solo homer off Diamondbacks lefty Brandyn Garcia.

The Diamondbacks threatened against Dodgers setup man Tanner Scott. But he escaped a bases-loaded jam in the eighth by winning a 12-pitch at-bat against Arenado for the inning-ending strikeout.

Bubic joins the team

Trade-deadline acquisition Kris Bubic, who is rehabbing at the Dodgers’ Arizona complex, is taking advantage of the opportunity to be around the team this weekend at Chase Field.

“It’s been a whirlwind the last couple days,” Bubic said. “Obviously I had been with Kansas City the whole time since I was drafted. I’ve been there my whole big-league career. I’d been on the shelf for a little bit now, but to hear I was getting traded over here was pretty exciting.

“Obviously the roster speaks for itself. The success speaks for itself. The opportunity to be a part of this, to learn from these guys, all the coaches on the staff and whatnot, it’s going to be an exciting time. I’m really looking forward to getting started.”

Pitcher Kris Bubic throws during a game between the Kansas City Royals and Seattle Mariners on May 3.

(Lindsey Wasson / Associated Press)

Bubic initially landed on the injured list in mid-May with a low-grade flexor strain in his left forearm, he specified. While working back from that injury, he had setbacks with an impingement in his left shoulder.

Because he has an injury history with both his elbow (2023 Tommy John surgery) and shoulder (2025 rotator cuff strain), the Royals didn’t rush him back. Bubic said he had a cortisone injection on July 1 and then threw off a mound on Sunday.

“I’m kind of itching to get back going,” he said. “But I know talking with the staff here they’ve got a pretty good plan. I’m expected to come out of the ‘pen in some capacity. At this point, I’m looking forward to getting back on the field and helping this team down the stretch.”

Bubic said the Dodgers have already presented him with a couple mechanical tweaks. He hopes to begin a minor-league rehab assignment around the end of the month or beginning of September.

Homestand plan

The Dodgers plan to pitch two-time Cy Young winners in back-to-back games against the Royals when they return to Los Angeles next week.

On Monday, Tarik Skubal is scheduled to make his first home start at Dodger Stadium, and second with the Dodgers since being acquired in a trade with the Detroit Tigers. On Wednesday, Blake Snell is set to return from the IL for his second start of the season, his first since May.

CHICAGO — Dodgers third base coach Dino Ebel went directly to Shohei Ohtani’s competition for NL MVP with his gripe.

Ebel, who coached Cubs star center fielder Pete Crow-Armstrong with Team USA in the World Baseball Classic this year, gave him grief for serving as the designated hitter on Wednesday. He couldn’t play center field every day?

Ohtani and Crow-Armstrong had just traded leadoff home runs, so Crow-Armstrong told reporters that he shot back with: “Well, it took your guy 10 pitches, it only took me one.”

He was exaggerating slightly. Ohtani’s leadoff homer came on the seventh pitch of the at-bat against Cubs left-hander Shota Imanaga. And that, of course, wasn’t really how Crow-Armstrong felt.

“A [seven]-pitch at-bat to start the game and finish it off with a 110 [mph] ball at 20 degrees is pretty ridiculous,” Crow-Armstrong said.

The National League MVP race transformed into a head-to-head showdown between the frontrunners at Wrigley Field on Wednesday, as the Dodgers fell to the Cubs 7-6.

“Over the course of a season, there’s a lot of ups and downs,” Ohtani, a four-time MVP, said through interpreter Will Ireton. “It’s too early to think about that. So in a way for me it’s more important for the team to win and for me to contribute to that.”

Though Crow-Armstrong played along with the MVP talk, he came around to a similar sentiment.

“I would be crazy to say that I don’t want to win an MVP, but if we’re talking about having priorities straight, I think mine are pretty straight,” he said. “It’s not on the forefront of my mind. It’s fun to joke about and it’s fun to acknowledge and I think it’s absolutely OK to pay attention to. But it’s not following me up to the plate.

“If you guys want to talk about all this back and forth, like, I really should go get in the lab and start pitching. I really should.”

Ohtani was considered the runaway MVP favorite early in the year, while his pitching performance also put him in the Cy Young conversation. But his extended absence from the mound (left knee issue) and Crow-Armstrong’s contributions on offense and defense have made the race more interesting.

Crow-Armstrong entered Wednesday leading the majors in fWAR (7.5), followed by Ohtani (6.4).

Chicago Cubs designated hitter Pete Crow-Armstrong drops the bat after hitting his second home run against the Dodgers.

(Jessie Alcheh / Associated Press)

“Simply put, just having your name in the same conversation as someone as profound as [Ohtani] feels, it’s awesome and it’s a nice nod,” Crow-Armstrong said. “It’s cool. But … I would feel much more accomplished taking them (the Dodgers) down at some point. I want to see this group (the Cubs) in October because I think it’ll be a dangerous, dangerous group in the playoffs.”

Dodgers manager Dave Roberts irked Cubs fans a week and a half ago when, asked to evaluate Ohtani’s season overall, he said he’ll still be the NL MVP.

“I haven’t followed the race,” Roberts said before the game Wednesday. “I have followed what Pete’s doing, and he’s figured some things out with the bat. “He’s having a heck of a year. And he has rightfully made it a lot closer than most people expected. He’s had a tremendous season.”

That continued in the finale of the three-game series, for Crow-Armstrong and Ohtani.

Ohtani, struck first, notching the 32nd leadoff homer of his career and 29th as a Dodger, breaking a tie with Davey Lopes for the second-most in franchise history, behind Mookie Betts (32).

In the bottom half of the inning, Crow-Armstrong matched Ohtani with a tying blast.

The next inning, he delivered a two-run double, and in the fourth, he mashed a two-run blast off the right-field scoreboard to put the Cubs up 5-1.

Not to be outdone, Ohtani led off the fifth inning with a single, but the Dodgers failed to score. Then in the eighth, he made it his first multi-homer game of the season, with a two-run shot that trimmed the Cubs’ lead to 7-6.

“He’s a great player,” Ohtani said of Crow-Armstrong. “But I’m really focused on myself on the hitting side of things right now, really working towards hopefully getting back on the mound and working on that side of the game as well.”

Ohtani’s timeline back to the mound is nebulous at this point. Roberts didn’t have a specific day circled to resume playing catch, and Ohtani didn’t provide one, either.

“It’s getting pretty good day by day,” Ohtani said of his knee. “It’s hard to tell at this point what the schedule is going to look like. First I need to do [weighted ply balls], then go into long toss, then go into a bullpen progression. Rather than rush the progression of this I would rather make sure we’re headed in the right direction. But making sure we’re taking the right steps.”

The Dodgers’ rotation depth means he doesn’t necessarily need to build up to a full starter’s workload by the end of the year. Ohtani said he’d leave the timing of his progression up to the front office.

“Any innings we get from him are bonuses, given he’s a two-way player,” Roberts said. “Whether it’s one inning, two innings, three innings, I’m not too concerned about the timeline. … I certainly see him as a starter, but how much he could give us, to then have somebody [piggybacking] behind him, that we don’t know yet.”

Freddie Freeman pulled

Dodgers first baseman Freddie Freeman left the game in the bottom of the fifth inning after a pitch hit his right hand. But X-rays came back negative, Roberts said.

“I obviously didn’t come out of that at-bat because I knew it hit my bat as well,” Freeman said. “It hit bat, then hand and pinched my hand onto the bat. Next pitch, I swung. I could swing, and I swung again. As the adrenaline wore off, pain got a little bit more.”

Freeman said he expects to be ready to return to the lineup by the Dodgers’ next game, against the Arizona Diamondbacks on Friday.

Dodgers president of baseball operations Andrew Friedman felt good enough about his trade discussions with the Detroit Tigers for two-time Cy Young winner Tarik Skubal that he gave manager Dave Roberts a positive update shortly before the team’s game against the Red Sox on Saturday.

“I heard that it was pretty much done,” Roberts recounted Sunday afternoon. “But there’s obviously things that have to go on with medical, so it wasn’t actually even finalized. I just heard that it was pretty much close.”

Friedman, however, wasn’t ready to exhale until he got final word from the Tigers during the game.

“I had no idea and was trying to emotionally hedge,” he said. “I wasn’t getting too high or too low on it until we actually found out.”

There was, it turned out, no need to stress. On Saturday, the Dodgers agreed to trade three prospects — outfielder Zyhir Hope (No. 25 on MLB Pipeline’s top 100), right-handed pitcher River Ryan (No. 68) and right-hander Brady Smith — to the Tigers for one of the best starters in baseball.

The teams officially announced the trade Sunday.

Even as the Dodgers signaled a potentially low-key trade deadline in the lead-up — “we try to do everything we can to avoid not having to do something,” Friedman said last week — many rival executives and scouts had come to see the Dodgers landing Skubal as practically inevitable.

Of course, the World Series favorites didn’t need to acquire Skubal. But if they wanted him, they’d get him.

And they did.

“Friday it started picking up a little bit,” Friedman said. “But [Saturday] it was much more aggressive back and forth and a lot of different conversations. Obviously being on our side, you didn’t really know how long the process was gonna go, whether it was gonna go into Sunday, into Monday. But obviously we were of the mind to be aggressive and try to get a deal done.

“We were of the mind to be aggressive for one player this deadline, and fortunately we were able to line up.”

Andrew Friedman, Dodgers president of baseball operations, speaks to reporters on Jan. 21.

(Damian Dovarganes / Associated Press)

Two aspects of the trade did, however, take the industry by surprise: the timing and the return.

The Dodgers pulled off the trade without disrupting their major-league squad. Ryan, who made four major-league starts in 2024, has the stuff to compete in the majors, but health has kept him from another call-up.

“Obviously they felt good going through it,” Friedman said. “We gave up a lot of talent. Those guys are really good, and have a chance to be really good major-league players. But with where our core is, this moment in time, it was something that we felt like, erring on the side of aggressive made the most sense right now.”

Skubal joins Yoshinobu Yamamoto, Blake Snell, Tyler Glasnow and Shohei Ohtani as postseason rotation options, creating an enviable surplus if all five are healthy in October.

“I think it’s arguably the best rotation of all time — as if it wasn’t before as well,” catcher Dalton Rushing said. “Hope he’s ready to win a ring.”

Said veteran utility player Miguel Rojas: “It’s a statement from this organization to the rest of the league and the world that they’re not just satisfied with what happened the last couple years. … It’s kind of like a pressed button for us to kind of continue to go and not let the rest of the league catch up to our standards.”

Of course, health is never guaranteed. Skubal and Snell have undergone surgeries to remove loose bodies from their pitching elbows. Skubal has made nine appearances since, and Snell is scheduled to make one more rehab start before being activated off the injured list.

Glasnow, on the verge of a rehab assignment, has been sidelined for nearly three months with back spasms, an injury the Dodgers initially hoped wouldn’t even need an IL stint.

Ohtani’s nagging knee problem creates the most uncertainty. Ohtani hasn’t pitched in nearly a month, despite receiving an Orthovisc injection to lubricate the joint. He could restart playing catch this week in Chicago, Roberts said.

“We’re as confident as we can be that he’s going to be back and he’s going to start throwing soon and building back up,” Friedman said. “You can never perfectly predict the future but if you said, ‘Hey, place a bet on it,’ I would be very confident placing it that he would be back pitching.”

Pitcher Tarik Skubal is congratulated by teammates after playing in his final game with the Detroit Tigers on Wednesday against the Baltimore Orioles.

(Paul Sancya / Associated Press)

With this much time off, however, Ohtani will need to build back up to a starter’s workload without the benefit of a rehab assignment, similar to what he did last season. The timing of his return to the mound will dictate how long the build-up will be.

“We have a plan to build him up slowly, methodically,” Roberts said. “And that would have happened if this trade would have happened or not.”

In the meantime, the Dodgers are filling his spot in the rotation with the best possible option. Skubal is scheduled to make his Dodgers debut Tuesday against the Cubs in Chicago.

And the Dodgers aren’t necessarily done dealing. As of Sunday afternoon, they still were engaged on “a number of different conversations on a number of different fronts,” Friedman said.

When asked if the Dodgers could still add to the major-league roster, however, Friedman said that was “less likely.”

“Never say never,” he said. “Fortunately, we don’t have that acute need that we have to do this or our team is in real danger.”

He did, however, mention the Dodgers’ lack of an acute need before acquiring Skubal too.

Dodgers president of baseball operations Andrew Friedman all but confirmed Wednesday that the team would be in contact with the Tigers to gauge their asking price for reigning AL Cy Young winner Tarik Skubal.

“There just aren’t that many star-level players in the game,” Friedman said Wednesday afternoon when asked how aggressive the Dodgers would be in pursuing big-name players. “Any time one is available, we’re always going to participate in those conversations. We’ve shown to be very aggressive in the past. … We’ve traded a lot of really talented young players.

“But we’re able to be in those conversations because of the incredible work by our scouts and our front office and our player development group that has our farm system in such a strong spot to be able to talk to any team basically about any player.”

All that was expected. Checking in is simply due diligence.

Friedman avoided showing his hand when asked the odds of the Dodgers acquiring a player like that at the deadline.

“I don’t know,” he said. “I’m not in the handicapping business.”

Part of the calculation, with the Tigers on a skid that could push them to sell at the deadline, will be the health of the Dodgers’ pitching staff, which is steadily improving. So, instead of trying to fill specific holes, the Dodgers have the luxury of reading the market and being “a little bit more selective and opportunistic.”

Before the Dodgers’ game against the Mariners on Wednesday, they activated closer Edwin Díaz and designated left-hander Charlie Barnes for assignment. Right-handed starter Tyler Glasnow (back spasms) threw two innings of live batting practice, and right-handed reliever Blake Treinen (right elbow inflammation) threw one simulated inning.

Over in Class-A Ontario, left-hander Blake Snell (arthroscopic elbow surgery) was set to make what could be his last rehab start before being reinstated from the IL, although Friedman said the team was still talking through the next steps.

Two-way star Shohei Ohtani’s timeline back to the mound is the biggest unknown, but Friedman insisted that his lingering knee injury didn’t change the Dodgers’ evaluation of its rotation heading into the deadline.

“I don’t think it puts it in an acute need at all,” Friedman said. “We’re confident he’s going to come back. Again, if there was something structural, then we would be much more concerned with that. But there’s not. And the fact that it does keep improving suggests that we’re on the right path and feel very confident that he will be back.

“And then that’s also where it gets to the depth that we have and the talented arms that have stepped up with some of our injuries, that we feel like deserved an opportunity to keep going. So it just doesn’t fall into acute. That being said, we’re always open-minded to different things.”

Friedman also offered some insight on Ohtani’s right biceps injury, which he first publicly acknowledged on July 3 and that he said Tuesday night was not 100%. Ohtani hasn’t pitched in a game since that July 3 start, when the biceps issue flared in his last at-bat.

“If it weren’t for the knee, he would be pitching right now, he would be making his regular turn [in the rotation],” Friedman said. “We kept the arm going. Does he feel 100% in his arm? No. But neither does any pitcher in late July. But this is around the knee and making sure that we can get it to a place where there’s just no compensation. So exactly when that is, I’m not sure. But I feel confident that relatively soon, he’s going to start getting out and start ramping up for catch play and bullpens and getting him back.”

Ohtani’s timeline, however, hasn’t progressed the way the Dodgers initially expected since receiving an Orthovisc injection to lubricate his knee at the beginning of the All-Star break. They’d hoped he’d return to the rotation in its first turn out of the break. Instead, he threw a bullpen in Philadelphia last week, and then his throwing program stalled.

It’s also unclear what version of Ohtani the Dodgers will get when he returns to the mound.

“There’s no question it got significantly better,” Ohtani said in Japanese of the effects of the injection. “But after talking with the doctors, I don’t think it’s realistic to expect the pain to be zero. That may end up being something that has to wait until the offseason. In the meantime, I’ll keep working through my rehab program and try to get it as close to zero [pain] as possible.”

While playing through the knee injury, and searching for a mechanical adjustment to take some pressure off it, Ohtani’s execution has wavered. He had a 4.38 ERA in his last four starts, compared to 0.74 in his first 10.

“I think it speaks to the knee and the delivery and just the challenge of repeating it over and over and over again,” Friedman said, “and more speaks to why we are doing this and making sure that we get it calmed down and in a good spot so he can repeat. Then I’ll bet on him to execute.”

Shohei Ohtani has not pitched in a game for the Dodgers since July 3, though he admitted after Tuesday’s game that there’s more going on than just a sore left knee.

“My biceps is not 100%,” said Ohtani through interpreter Will Ireton while speaking with the media for the first time since before the All-Star break. “Just [a] similar issue with the knee. Do we consider pushing this? It is still July. So, I think the conversation would be a little different if we’re in August or September.”

Ohtani, who has remained in the lineup at designated hitter, has stalled in his throwing program after the team scratched a bullpen session tentatively scheduled for last Saturday that was to come on the heels of a roughly 30-pitch side session he threw last Wednesday in Philadelphia.

Ohtani received an orthovisc injection in his knee on July 12 and he skipped All-Star Game obligations in Philadelphia to allow for rest and recovery. But it remains unclear when Ohtani will return to the mound, and though manager Dave Roberts remains optimistic about him pitching again this season, concerns about building back up start to factor in.

“We are getting closer to that,” Roberts said. “You know, he’s a starting pitcher, and then, when you start missing three, four, five weeks of that build-up, then you’ve got to kind of start up again.”

Ohtani, who led off Tuesday’s 7-6 loss to the Seattle Mariners with a home run, clarified the origins of his knee problem and shared an estimate of where it’s at strength-wise.

“The discomfort was caused initially by the pitching,” Ohtani said. “So, it’s something I have to work around. In terms of running, I’m not exactly at 100% capacity. When I know it’s not, then it’s always a little harder to be aggressive on the basepaths.”

Ohtani and Roberts both said that the Dodgers haven’t reached a point of considering shutting down Ohtani from pitching.

“Everything that I’ve heard, that’s not the option,” Roberts said. “I guess anything’s possible, but for me, it’s highly unlikely.”

Added Ohtani: “The knee is where it is in terms of, for it to heal is the most important priority. I don’t think the team has really come to a place exactly where, do I pitch through it or not. That’s still really up in the air.”

In other injury-related updates, Kiké Hernández was activated Tuesday after being out since May 26 with a grade 3 oblique strain. Alex Freeland was optioned to triple-A Oklahoma City in a corresponding move.

“All you can do is take it one day at a time,” said Hernández, who did not play Tuesday. “And the best way that you can take things one day at a time is focusing on what you can do today to get better. And that’s what I did … literally going one day at a time and trying to be the best rehabber I could … the best teammate that I could. … It’s been a really long time. … So, I feel pretty good, and happy to see what I can do out on the field.”

Hernández had already made his season debut late — on May 25 — because of his recovery from offseason elbow surgery. Now, the 34-year-old utilityman is grateful to be back and eager to build on his four-for-four start over two games.

“A lot of nervousness,” Hernández said about playing again, mentioning that he had a panic attack when first learning of his worse-than-expected diagnosis. “I feel pretty good. … I feel like everything is in a pretty good spot right now. Trying to keep my 1.000 batting average going and be the best hitter in the league.

“[I’m] just happy to be back with the boys.”

Edwin Díaz will be the next to return.

The right-handed closer is scheduled to be activated Wednesday — fittingly, when 40,000 fans will receive an Díaz bobblehead — after missing three months because of right elbow surgery.

“He’s checked all his boxes,” Roberts said. “So getting him back in the mix is going to be fun for all of us as well.”

Meanwhile, Will Smith is starting baseball activities “pain-free” after sitting on the injured list since June 5 with a neck injury, Roberts added, and Tyler Glasnow will throw a live session Wednesday after being out since May with a back problem.

Dominic Canzone’s go-ahead home run in the eighth spoiled a Tuesday night of leaderboard climbing for Max Muncy and Shohei Ohtani as the Mariners beat the Dodgers 7-6 in the first game at Dodger Stadium since before the All-Star break on July 12.

With one out, Julio Rodríguez on first and the score tied at five, Canzone got all of Alex Vesia’s 82-mph slider, sending it 414 feet to center to help lift Seattle to its first win over the Dodgers in five years and first in Los Angeles since June 28, 2009.

“I mean it’s a pitch that’s had different results,” Vesia said. “Obviously it’s not the best pitch. I would have liked to have it more outside or more down. Kind of just flush it and on to the next one. Clearly need to be better in that situation. I felt like my stuff was good after that.”

Added manager Dave Roberts: “Alex made a really bad pitch, [an] 0-1 slider that was middle-middle, and they were hitting the ball out of the ballpark. So, that’s kind of the tale of the run prevention tonight.”

The Dodgers (67-40), with some much-needed help from dubious Mariners fielding, did have Ohtani on third and Muncy on second as the tying and game-winning runs in the ninth. But Seattle reliever Andrés Muñoz survived, putting an end to the thrilling opener of this three-game series.

Seattle won the offensive slugfest with 10 hits and five home runs to the home team’s 13 hits and two homers.

Canzone led the Mariners with two homers — his first, a solo shot, went 433 feet to center in the sixth — while Rodríguez, Cal Raleigh and Rob Refsnyder all hit one apiece.

Mariners right-handed starter Luis Castillo struggled and surrendered five runs, 11 hits and a pair of homers through five innings. But Dodgers lefty Justin Wrobleski, coming off six innings of one-run ball in last Tuesday’s win in Philadelphia, wasn’t his best either. He surrendered five runs and four homers through six innings.

“They obviously had a good approach against me,” Wrobleski said. “We didn’t do the greatest job of kind of adjusting to their game plan. And yeah, they got me. That’s part of the game. … It’s definitely not a thing that I want to have happen again, but again, it’s a learning experience.”

“Going back and looking at it, I still threw the ball pretty well,” Wrobleski added. “I mean, I know that sounds crazy considering the number and the line … but at the end of the day … I didn’t do a great job of adjusting.”

Muncy and Ohtani, though, still had nights to remember.

Ohtani kick-started the scoring with his 10th leadoff homer of the season, which was also the 34th of his nine-year MLB career and 28th with the Dodgers. The 432-footer to center tied the two-way superstar with Davey Lopes for the second-most leadoff homers in franchise history. Mookie Betts is first on the list with 32.

“Tonight, he looked like himself,” Roberts said of Ohtani, who remains off the mound. “I do think that the road trip was exhausting for everyone. I do think that with the day off, he came in fresh and looked more like himself.”

Muncy, meanwhile, launched a home run 430 feet to right in the fifth to tie Eric Karros for the most homers in Dodger Stadium history with 130. Muncy, who has spent the past nine years with L.A. after spending his first two seasons in Oakland, could be standing alone by the end of the Dodgers’ current six-game homestand.

Injury updates

Kiké Hernández was activated Tuesday after being out since May 26 with a grade 3 oblique strain. Alex Freeland was optioned to triple-A Oklahoma City in a corresponding move.

“All you can do is take it one day at a time,” Hernández said. “And the best way that you can take things one day at a time is focusing on what you can do today to get better. And that’s what I did … literally going one day at a time and trying to be the best rehabber I could … the best teammate that I could. … It’s been a really long time. … So, I feel pretty good, and happy to see what I can do out on the field.”

Hernández had already made his season debut late — on May 25 — because of his recovery from offseason elbow surgery. Now, the 34-year-old utilityman is grateful to be back and eager to build on his four-for-four start over two games.

“A lot of nervousness,” Hernández said about playing again, mentioning that he had a panic attack when first learning of his worse-than-expected diagnosis. “I feel pretty good. … I feel like everything is in a pretty good spot right now. Trying to keep my 1.000 batting average going and be the best hitter in the league.

“[I’m] just happy to be back with the boys.”

Edwin Díaz will be the next to return.

The right-handed closer is scheduled to be activated Wednesday — fittingly, when 40,000 fans will receive an Díaz bobblehead — after missing three months because of right elbow surgery.

“He’s checked all his boxes,” Roberts said. “So getting him back in the mix is going to be fun for all of us as well.”

Meanwhile, Will Smith is starting baseball activities “pain-free” after sitting on the injured list since June 5 with a neck injury, Roberts added, and Tyler Glasnow will throw a live session Wednesday after being out since May with a back problem.

Ohtani’s status as a pitcher, however, remains murky. Roberts mentioned an undesirable ramp-up period being in play for Ohtani, as it has been over a month since he last pitched due to irritation in his left knee.

Ohtani himself clarified the origins of his knee problem and shared an estimate of where it’s at strength-wise.

“The discomfort was caused initially by the pitching,” Ohtani said. “So, it’s something I have to work around. In terms of running, I’m not exactly at 100% capacity. When I know it’s not, then it’s always a little harder to be aggressive on the basepath.”

Ohtani and Roberts both said that the Dodgers haven’t reached a point of considering shutting down No. 17 as a pitcher — but never say never.

“Everything that I’ve heard, that’s not the option,” Roberts said. “I guess anything’s possible, but for me, it’s highly unlikely.”

Added Ohtani: “The knee is where it is in terms of, for it to heal is the most important priority. I don’t think the team has really come to a place exactly where, do I pitch through it or not. That’s still really up in the air.”

But that’s not all. Ohtani shared that his biceps is bothering him, too.

“My biceps not 100%,” Ohtani added. “Just [a] similar issue with the knee. Do we consider pushing this? It is still July. So, I think the conversation would be a little different if we’re in August or September.”

“We are getting closer to that,” Roberts said. “You know, he’s a starting pitcher, and then, when you start missing three, four, five weeks of that build-up, then you’ve got to kind of start up again.”

The Dodgers do not have to do anything. They’re in on everything, including Tarik Skubal.

With one week left before baseball’s trade deadline, the Dodgers are doing what the Dodgers always do. When you are flush with money and prospects, you can invite yourself into just about every conversation, from checking in on a star player to sniffing around for a three-way deal in which you trade away major league depth to acquire even more prospects.

“Not having an acute need at this time of year is very helpful,” Dodgers president of baseball operations Andrew Friedman said Tuesday.

It ain’t bragging if you can back it up. The Dodgers boast baseball’s best record, with seven key players expected to return from significant injuries over the next two months. Then comes the quest for a three-peat: the chance to become the first team in National League history to win three consecutive World Series championships.

To me, that should be the most compelling element of the Dodgers’ trade deadline strategy.

Friedman repeatedly has said he would like this era to be remembered as “the golden age of Dodger baseball,” and nothing says legacy like doing something that never has been done.

And, if major league owners get their way, something that might never be done again.

We’re not just talking about the owners of teams tired of getting beaten by the Dodgers. We’re talking about Friedman’s boss, Mark Walter.

“We can’t win all the time,” Walter told me this spring.

The owners are prepared to shut down the sport until they get a salary cap, but even a compromise with the players’ union would almost certainly involve some kind of spending restraints intended to make Friedman’s job tougher.

Act now, even in a way that might make you feel uncomfortable, because this chance might never come again.

“We feel this current team is as talented and tight-knit of a group as we’ve had,” Friedman said, “and we’ve been extremely aggressive over the past offseasons to try to put that group together.

“To the extent we can add to it, we’ve shown in the past that we’ll be aggressive on that front as well, but it’s good going into this last week feeling as good as we do about this group.”

On the one hand, Friedman himself, and Walter himself, and Dave Roberts and Shohei Ohtani and Mookie Betts and a cast of heroes talked up a three-peat at last year’s championship celebration.

Walter: “All I have to say to you is, we’ll be back next year.”

Friedman: “How about we do it again?”

Betts: “Three-peat ain’t never sounded so sweet.”

On the other hand, well, the Dodgers won the World Series last year without trading for the outfielder and closer the world said they needed, then committed $309 million to outfielder Kyle Tucker and closer Edwin Díaz in the winter.

“We don’t really think of the 2026 World Series as a three-peat,” Friedman said Tuesday. “ ‘24 and ‘25 are in the bank. As soon as you get into the offseason and into spring training, it’s all about winning in ‘26.

“That is somewhat semantics, but the context is that it’s no different than in any other year, in the sense of doing everything we can to win the last game of the year. I would think the aggressiveness last offseason would fully demonstrate that.”

On Tuesday, Fangraphs projected the Dodgers had a 25% chance to win the World Series, more than twice as high as any other team. A third catcher would help, and a reliever might too, but neither would lift that percentage in any meaningful way so much as provide insurance should Will Smith’s recovery from his neck injury stall or the bullpen implode.

Skubal might not lift that percentage much, either, in place of Ohtani or Blake Snell or Tyler Glasnow in the starting rotation. The Dodgers project all three to be healthy in October and, if not, they have All-Star Justin Wrobleski.

But Wrobleski already has set a professional high for innings pitched, and Skubal would provide a big lift to the teams most likely to keep the Dodgers from returning to the World Series: the Milwaukee Brewers, Atlanta Braves and Chicago Cubs.

And, although the Dodgers pride themselves on running a team whose championship window never closes, they already field the oldest lineup in the majors. In the NHL, owners shut down an entire season to get a salary cap.

Let’s say the 2027 baseball season starts late. By the end of the season, the Dodgers could field a lineup in which every position player besides Andy Pages was at least 30 years old, including Freddie Freeman at 38, Max Muncy at 37, Betts at 34 and Ohtani at 33.

Friedman called it “a fool’s errand” to try to predict the outcome of collective bargaining negotiations and disputed the thought that the Dodgers might miss a window by not maximizing whatever chance they have this year.

“I just think this is a really, really talented team,” he said. “If we had an acute need and it was like, ‘Oh, you didn’t address that,’ then, yeah, we missed an opportunity.

“In this game, there’s just no guarantees of anything. You just make the smartest decisions you can and hope it plays out in a way where you have some good fortune and you win the last game of the year.”

Perhaps “three-peat” should not be the word of the week. Perhaps we should substitute “three-peat-maxxing.”

NEW YORK — Kyle Tucker’s first home run in nearly a month lifted the Dodgers to a 4-2 victory over the New York Mets on Friday night.

Starting pitcher Roki Sasaki held the Mets to just three hits, which included a solo homer from Luis Roberts Jr. that accounted for the only run Sasaki surrendered. He threw seven innings for the third time this season.

The extra velocity that Sasaki mustered in his last start against the New York Yankees — when he surpassed 101 mph in a regular season game for the first time in his MLB career — didn’t make an encore against the Mets (43-61).

Instead, Sasaki leaned on his splitter, throwing it 47% of the time, compared to his season average of 26%.

The Dodgers tied the score 1-1 in the fourth inning. Freddie Freeman, who finished with three hits, led with a single. Mookie Betts matched him, then Miguel Rojas stayed back on a changeup and sent it to deep right field for a sacrifice fly.

The Dodgers twice fell victim to Mets right fielder Carson Benge’s arm in the fifth and sixth. First, Shohei Ohtani was thrown out trying to stretch a double into a triple after a relay throw by Francisco Lindor. Benge threw out Freeman at the plate in the sixth on a Rojas popout to right.

Kyle Tucker follows through on a two-run home run for the Dodgers in the eighth inning of a 4-2 win Friday night over the New York Mets.

(Jim McIsaac / Getty Images)

In the seventh, the Dodgers (66-38) started to build another rally. Dalton Rushing laid down a bunt with runners on the corners. But it bounced right to pitcher Brooks Raley, who flipped the ball to the plate to eventually snare Tucker in a rundown between third and home.

On the next at-bat, Ohtani drove in Teoscar Hernández from third on a sacrifice fly to center field.

Tucker’s two-run homer in the eighth provided the Dodgers some insurance they would end up using when Evan Phillips gave up a solo homer to Francisco Alvarez in the bottom of the inning. It was Tucker’s first home run since June 27.

Injury updates

Right-hander Tyler Glasnow (back spasms) has progressed to the live batting practice phase of his rehab progression, manager Dave Roberts said. It’s a promising sign for a pitcher who twice had to shut down throwing early in his rehab when he aggravated the injury.

Closer Edwin Díaz (arthroscopic elbow surgery) came out well from throwing on back-to-back days in a triple A rehab assignment.

“We talked about him flying across the country; doesn’t make a lot of sense,” Roberts said. “So I think he’s supposed to pitch on Sunday, and then if that goes well, he should be back with us when we get back on Tuesday.”

The Dodgers begin a six-game homestand Tuesday, against the Seattle Mariners and Boston Red Sox.

Catcher Will Smith’s timeline to return from a neck injury remains unclear, after the Dodgers temporarily shut him down from baseball activities, beginning around the All-Star break.

“He’s pain free,” Roberts. “He’s getting back into being more active.”

ESPN’s 30 for 30 will launch the first two of six podcast episodes July 28 examining the gambling scandal that resulted in Shohei Ohtani‘s interpreter Ippei Mizuhara going to prison for stealing nearly $17 million from the baseball superstar and gambling it away.

The podcast, titled “The Betrayal of Shohei Ohtani” is told by Tisha Thompson, the ESPN investigative reporter who led the outlet’s groundbreaking coverage in March 2024.

Ohtani, who signed a record 10-year, $700-million contract with the Dodgers in December 2023 after playing six years with the Angels, apparently trusted Mizuhara implicitly. He said he was unaware that the interpreter regularly ransacked his bank account for more than two years.

The podcast will recount Mizuhara’s life before he began working for Ohtani in 2013 when both were with the Hokkaido Nippon-Ham Fighters in Japan. When Ohtani moved to the United States to play for the Angels in 2018, Mizuhara came with him.

Thompson interviews childhood friends and colleagues of Mizuhara, but the interview that will generate the greatest interest is a 90-minute phone call she had with him 16 hours before she published the story. Thompson got permission from Mizuhara to tape the call and it remains the only interview he has given.

Mizuhara told her that Ohtani had helped him pay off his gambling debts, a story he recanted a day later. The Dodgers fired him the same day they opened the 2024 season with a game against the San Diego Padres in Seoul, South Korea.

IRS special agent Chris Seymour gave Thompson the first interview of his career, and what he and prosecutors say about Mizuhara’s motive goes beyond the narrative that he had a gambling addiction, according to ESPN.

Another interview by Thompson is with bookmaker Mathew Bowyer, who explains on tape that his relationship with Mizuhara began during a hotel poker game with Angels players. Bowyer pleaded guilty last year to running an illegal gambling business, money laundering and filing a false tax return. He was sentenced to 12 months and one day in prison and ordered to pay $1.6 million in restitution to the IRS.

Episodes one and two — “The Letter O” and “The Interview” — will debut July 28, followed by episodes dropping every Tuesday and Thursday through Aug. 11.

PHILADELPHIA — Emmet Sheehan backpedaled down the mound, watching the ball fly just over the left-field wall.

His start Monday, much like his season, had its ups and downs. But just when it seemed he’d found a groove, he gave up a momentum-swinging solo home run to Philadelphia’s Brandon Marsh in the sixth inning of the Dodgers’ 10-7 loss to the Phillies.

It was Sheehan’s first start since the All-Star break, pushed back because of a rainout Saturday in New York. He gave up six runs in 5⅓ innings, raising concerns again over his inconsistency. While the Dodgers (63-38) weather the loss of Shohei Ohtani from the rotation, they need steadiness from the rest of their starters.

“Certainly, he’s getting a lot of opportunity,” manager Dave Roberts said of Sheehan. “It’s not the consistency that any of us like or want, Emmet included. Until there’s another alternative, we’re going to keep running him out there.”

One bad inning from Sheehan pushed the game into the Phillies’ favor. With one out in the second, he gave up three straight hits, a sacrifice fly and a two-run homer by Trea Turner to put the Dodgers behind 4-0.

Sheehan adjusted, navigating the next three innings efficiently without giving up a run.

“It’s just really trying to be convicted in his pitch-making before he touches the stove,” Roberts said. “When there’s damage or things have happened, then he locks in, raises his level of intensity a little bit more. But it’s just got to be that before, you know, things start happening.”

It was clear Sheehan’s delivery wasn’t fully in sync. His velocity steadily dropped, with his fastball averaging 94.7 mph in the first inning and 92.7 in the fifth. But he gave the Dodgers’ offense time to chip away at the Phillies’ lead.

“It’s just trying to keep myself from being frustrated and knowing that our offense is so good that we’re in every game,” Sheehan said.

The Dodgers scored in the fourth when Mookie Betts came home from third as Teoscar Hernández hit into a double play. They scored two more runs in the sixth, with Max Muncy delivering an RBI double after Cristopher Sánchez’s start ended after 99 pitches.

The tide really began to turn later in the inning with two outs and the bases loaded. Andy Pages chopped a slow bouncer up the middle, and Turner charged. The ball hit off the heel of the Phillies shortstop’s glove, and another run scored.

Boos poured down even as Turner was chasing the ball. It didn’t matter that he’d hit the second-inning homer; Phillies fans were going to make it clear how upset they were about his second defensive mistake of the night.

The Dodgers, however, didn’t ride the momentum for long.

Three pitches into the bottom of the sixth, Sheehan grooved a fastball to Marsh, and he hit it out for a 5-3 lead. A double to center — which bounced off Pages’ glove — and a strikeout later, Sheehan handed over the ball.

Mookie Betts celebrates after hitting a home run for the Dodgers in the seventh inning Monday.

(Chris Szagola / Associated Press)

“I thought we had a pretty good handle on [my delivery] coming in,” Sheehan said. “The past few starts have been better with that, and then kind of a step back today, which is pretty frustrating.”

Alex Vesia then surrendered a walk and a three-run homer to Turner, who won back the fans (until another botched grounder in the ninth).

From there, the game became a slugfest. Betts, who went four for five, hit two home runs — a solo shot in the seventh and a two-run blast in the ninth.

The Phillies (56-45) hit two homers off Landon Knack to finish with five.

Ohtani update

Ohtani likely will throw off a mound late in the week, Roberts said. But it is still unclear when his next pitching start will be. Ohtani, who has continued to play as the designated hitter, went 0 for 4 on Monday.

Ohtani, who has missed his last two starts and received an Orthovisc injection to manage lingering discomfort in his left knee, has continued to throw on flat ground. He again played catch in left field at Citizens Bank Park on Monday.

Dodgers make trade

The Dodgers added bullpen depth with upside, acquiring right-hander Seth Halvorsen from Colorado. They sent two minor leaguers — right-hander Nick Frasso, who has a 4.74 ERA in triple A, and outfielder Landyn Vidourek, a 2025 third-round pick — to the Rockies.

Halvorsen, coming off a stint on the injured list because of right shoulder inflammation, is set to join triple-A Oklahoma City. He throws a 100-mph fastball but hasn’t found a way to control it. He has a 4.31 ERA and 13 saves in three seasons.

“Hopefully we can unlock some levers,” Roberts said. “But the arm talent’s there. Our guys are really excited about him.”

NEW YORK — What if the Dodgers never get a full season of pitching from Shohei Ohtani?

In his first season with the Dodgers, he did not pitch at all. In his second, he did not pitch until June. And, halfway through this third season, Dodgers manager Dave Roberts admitted Sunday he could not say when Ohtani might pitch again.

“Don’t know yet,” Roberts said.

October might be your immediate concern, and it should concern the Dodgers too. Of the four starting pitchers they would plan to use in the postseason — Yoshinobu Yamamoto, Blake Snell, Tyler Glasnow and Ohtani — Yamamoto is the only one pitching major league innings right now. It’s not Tarik Skubal or bust, but the Dodgers should trade for someone they would start in a playoff game.

Yet, for a player with seven years left on his $700-million contract beyond this one, there might be a lot fewer opportunities to celebrate Ohtani as a two-way player than the Dodgers and their fans envision.

Ohtani did not pitch in his first year and a half with the Dodgers as he recovered from elbow surgery. When his rehabilitation was complete, he was good to go.

This is different. Ohtani is battling irritation in his left knee. Roberts used three concerning words to describe it: “wear and tear.”

There is no easy fix. The lubricant injection Ohtani received a week ago relieves symptoms for a short period of time, usually a few months. It is repeatable, but its benefits are not always felt right away.

The Dodgers had announced Ohtani would start Wednesday. Roberts said Ohtani experienced discomfort while playing catch, and that was enough for the Dodgers to push back his next start to…

“I would say that it’s going to be some time,” Roberts said. “It’s not going to be a day-to-day thing.”

Shohei Ohtani warms up before facing the Tampa Bay Rays at Dodger Stadium on June 15.

(Eric Thayer / Los Angeles Times)

If it is a wear-and-tear thing, there might be no solution besides management over the remainder of his career.

“I think it’s a little bit, it’s just like all of us, all athletes, that kind of have wear and tear,” Roberts said. “That’s just part of it, and now it’s just kind of showing itself a little bit, and then you got to manage it. I think that it’s the years of sliding, pitching, hitting and all that stuff.”

Ohtani is aware of this. He is 32. This is his 14th professional season. He reported to spring training with the goal of winning the National League Cy Young award, in part because who knows how long you can do everything at an elite level on a baseball field?

“Inside, I’m assuming this is my last chance as a pitcher,” Ohtani told the Japanese sports magazine Number in an interview published last month.

In his first 10 starts this season, he posted a 0.74 earned-run average, never giving up more than two runs in a start. In the four starts since the knee irritation surfaced June 10, his ERA is 4.38, and he has given up at least three runs in each start.

Can he pitch effectively if he can tolerate the discomfort? Would he want to? Would the Dodgers want him to, given their investment in him as one of the most dynamic hitters in baseball history?

To this point, Roberts said, Ohtani has experienced the irritation only on the mound, not at bat. As a result, Roberts said, the Dodgers do not believe shutting down Ohtani as a hitter for a few days would help ease the discomfort.

Maybe this works, with the injection calming the knee long enough to get Ohtani through the season, or with the irritation waning. Even then, it’s going to take some time.

“The first step is getting him into a spot where he feels like, and we feel like, he can pitch and not regress,” Roberts said.

Ohtani has not pitched in 16 days, and let’s say he does not pitch for another 16. Then the Dodgers would be looking at building back Ohtani’s endurance as they ramp up for the playoffs. So, even if Ohtani can return, could he pitch deep into a postseason game?

Shohei Ohtani hits a home run against the Tampa Bay Rays at Dodger Stadium on June 16.

(Eric Thayer / Los Angeles Times)

The Ohtani Effect is real, and grand. It is measured in T-shirts and ticket sales, tourists and movie promotions, bobblehead dolls and international corporate sponsorships.

But all of that should not obscure Ohtani’s greatness as a player.

If Aaron Judge cannot hit, he cannot help the Yankees, and they entered play Sunday 18-20 since he suffered a rib injury.

If Ohtani cannot pitch … well, he has hit 11 home runs since then, for the team with the best record in the major leagues.

The Dodgers do not believe Ohtani’s viability as a pitcher is in jeopardy, but we can already hear the cynics: In a worst-case scenario, if he could not pitch well again, would the contract be worth it?

It already is: Two full seasons, two World Series championships.

NEW YORK — The Dodgers don’t know when Shohei Ohtani will take the mound next.

He was tentatively scheduled to start Wednesday against the Phillies, after promising initial reports on his recovery from an injection in his left knee. But after seeing his knee’s response to playing catch, the team decided to give him more time.

“We just want to continue to give it the best chance to kind of get into a good spot,” manager Dave Roberts said. “And as he said, as we feel, it’s the pitching and the torque of landing on that leg that kind of gets it upset.”

It was clear enough from catch play that Ohtani’s start would have to be pushed back that Ohtani did not feel the need to test it by throwing off a mound, Roberts said.

“Where we’re at right now, how we’re proceeding, I would say that it’s going to be some time,” Roberts said. “It’s not going to be a day-to-day thing.”

That left a wide range of timeline possibilities, from days to weeks. Roberts did, however, rule out shutting Ohtani down from pitching for the rest of the season.

“I guess anything is possible, but I just don’t think that’s a possibility,” he said.

To fill Ohtani’s spot in the rotation this week, the Dodgers moved right-hander Emmet Sheehan’s start to Monday. Before the rainout bumped the second game of the series against the New York Yankees, Sheehan was scheduled to start Saturday.

For Sunday’s doubleheader, right-hander Yoshinobu Yamamoto will take the mound in the first game. The bullpen, and potentially multiple innings from the 27th man, will cover the nightcap.

“Honestly, a lot of it is where we’re at and how we’ve put ourselves in a good spot,” Roberts said of the MLB-leading Dodgers. “Could [Ohtani] probably do it? Sure. But right now, the benefits just don’t seem to outweigh the cost at this time of the season. So I think we still have plenty of time to get him to a good spot to then pitch.”

Ohtani, who went hitless in four at-bats as the designated hitter in Friday’s 2-1 win, was set to DH and hit leadoff in Sunday’s first game.

NEW YORK — Shohei Ohtani was at the top of the Dodgers’ lineup Friday against the New York Yankees, five days after receiving an injection in his left knee. And he’s penciled in to pitch against the Philadelphia Phillies on Wednesday.

Ohtani received an orthovisc shot in his knee to lubricate the joint and relieve irritation, manager Dave Roberts said, and did not have it drained.

“It gives him some relief in his knee which we were hoping to get,” Roberts said. “Then the four days off with no activity which gives it a chance to settle in.”

Ohtani was expected to be in the lineup for all three games against the Yankees. He planned to play catch and throw off the mound in the coming days, and the team would monitor his response before finalizing pitching plans.

Taking the mound Wednesday would give Ohtani more recovery time heading into the team’s day off. When asked if Ohtani would shoulder two-way duties Wednesday, Roberts said, “We’ll see when we get there.”

Dodgers star Shohei Ohtani hits his 300th career home run against the Colorado Rockies at Dodger Stadium on July 7.

(Eric Thayer / Los Angeles Times)

When it isn’t possible to have Ohtani pitch before a day off, Roberts would like to rest him the following day.

“It’s all contingent on how his knee is feeling,” Roberts said of Ohtani’s second-half workload. “I think we are certainly more prepared to back off on the workload if it calls for it. But Shohei wants to be out there as much as he possibly can.”

Asked if Ohtani would need offseason surgery, Roberts said: “I would highly doubt that.”

Coming out of the break, the Dodgers shuffled their rotation to have Roki Sasaki, Emmet Sheehan and Yoshinobu Yamamoto face the Yankees in that order.

That leaves left-handed starters Eric Lauer and Justin Wrobleski (not necessarily in that order), to face the Phillies before Ohtani would take the mound.

Smith shut down

The Dodgers are shutting down catcher Will Smith from all baseball activities for a week as he continues to deal with a lingering neck injury. That pushes his return timeline back to at least August, if not later.

“It was flaring up, wasn’t recovering — however you want to word it,” Roberts said. “He didn’t feel like he was making any improvement.”

Smith has been sidelined since early June because of what he described as an inflamed disk. He initially treated it with rest and then an injection. But it still was bothering him during his latest buildup.

“I talked to the trainer, Thomas [Albert], today and he said that Will doesn’t feel any pain,” Roberts said. “Now with that, I think we’re in a much better spot.”

Dodgers utility player Kiké Hernández (strained left oblique) was set to begin a rehab assignment with triple-A Oklahoma City on Friday. And left-hander Blake Snell was scheduled to take the mound for two innings Saturday in his first minor-league rehab start since undergoing surgery to remove loose bodies in his elbow.

Air quality concerns

The MLB schedule got off to a smoky start out of the All-Star break. With wildfires in Canada raising air-quality concerns in the Northeast and Midwest on Thursday, the New York Mets’ game at Citizens Bank Park in Philadelphia was moved up an hour.

The smoke cleared over Yankee Stadium on Friday afternoon.

“I know that the players got a players’ union text that says it’s a full go,” Roberts said. “They feel good about it. The league feels good. I haven’t heard anything otherwise.”

2027 schedule

With a lockout widely expected to start Dec. 1 and no guarantee of an agreement in time to preserve the 2027 season, take MLB’s schedule announcement Thursday with a grain of salt.

Should collective bargaining negotiations wrap up in time, however, the Dodgers are set to open the season at Dodger Stadium on March 25 against the Atlanta Braves.

They end the season on the road, facing a pair of division rivals in the Colorado Rockies and Arizona Diamondbacks from Sept. 21-26.