Los Angeles Dodgers' Shohei Ohtani hits a single against the Arizona Diamondbacks in the seventh inning during a baseball game, Monday, Sept. 2, 2024, in Phoenix. (AP Photo/Rick Scuteri)
With Shohei Ohtani having 57 stolen bases heading into Saturday night’s game in Denver against the Colorado Rockies, the Japanese sensation looked to have taken another quick step toward reaching 60 stolen bases. However, a Los Angeles Dodgers teammate’s errant swing turned Ohtani’s stolen base into an awkward double play.
In the first inning, Ohtani led off the game with a scorching single to right field, measuring 111.3 mph off the bat. With the next Dodgers batter, Mookie Betts, coming to the plate, all eyes were on Ohtani and his ability to steal bases.
On a 3-2 pitch to Betts, Ohtani got an incredible jump on Colorado starting pitcher Antonio Senzatela and appeared to have second base stolen easily. However, Betts swung at the full-count pitch, popping it up to Rockies first baseman Michael Toglia. The pop-up was so high, in fact, that Ohtani had a chance to get back to first base all the way from second before Toglia caught it and flipped into Senzatela, who was covering on the play.
However, even though Ohtani reached first before the throw, he had rounded second as the high pop-up was in the air. As he hustled to get back to first, he didn’t touch second on his return, meaning Colorado could finish off the double play by simply throwing the ball to second base.
Watch the crazy play below, and see just how far Ohtani was before he had to try to get back to first base.
Ohtani, the favorite to win the National League Most Valuable Player Award after becoming the first player in MLB history to hit 50 home runs and swipe 50 bases, passed Ichiro Suzuki on Friday night to set the single-season record for stolen bases by a Japanese-born player. Entering Saturday’s game, he had stolen 34 consecutive bases without being caught, the second-longest streak in Dodgers’ history behind the 38 totaled by Davey Lopes during the 1975 campaign.
That streak would have been extended to 35 had Betts not swung at Senzatela’s pitch.
