There are no hard feelings, but you'd have to imagine Shohei Ohtani would love to defeat his former team, the Los Angeles Angels, any chance he gets, as any player would in his shoes. Ohtani's Los Angeles Dodgers have dominated their crosstown rivals for years, but the 2025 campaign turned out to be very different. Not only did the Angels win the season series, but they swept the Dodgers, going 6-0 against the defending champions. This was in spite of Ohtani doing Ohtani-like things against the Halos.
Shohei Ohtani had a .333 average and a 1.240 OPS with three home runs and a triple against the Angels this season, as the Dodgers lost all six games pic.twitter.com/NhVfm0igfs
— Talkin’ Baseball (@TalkinBaseball_) August 14, 2025
Ohtani did his thing, but this week's series against the Angels showed once again that baseball is a team sport. Freddie Freeman and Max Muncy combined to go 3-for-22 in the three-game set. Yoshinnobu Yamamoto, Emmet Sheehan and even Ohtani struggled in their starts on the bump. The bullpen wasn't any good either. The Dodgers played poorly, as they have for a couple of months now, and lost first place in the NL West as a result. That outcome is one Ohtani sounds less than pleased with.
“Obviously, it doesn’t feel good to fall into second place and to lose a lot of these games,"two-way star Shohei Ohtani said through interpreter Will Ireton. "We’re doing everything in our power, having close meetings, doing everything that we can to try to right the ship. We just have to do a better job.”
Ohtani sounds downright defeated, and it's hard to blame him.
For more news and rumors, check out MLB Insider Robert Murray’s work on The Baseball Insiders podcast, subscribe to The Moonshot, our weekly MLB newsletter, and join the discord to get the inside scoop during the MLB season.
Dodgers stars must begin carrying their weight around Shohei Ohtani
Mookie Betts had a good series in Anaheim, but he's still having the worst season of his career by far. Freddie Freeman's numbers are pretty good overall and he's had a nice month of August thus far, but his .681 OPS since the start of June leaves a lot to be desired. On the pitching front, the Dodgers continue to struggle getting any sort of consistent length from their starters, and their bullpen has been uneven all year.
Ohtani has been Ohtani, but as we saw for years with him in an Angels uniform, it takes more than Ohtani to win. Other players need to start pulling their weight, and Ohtani admitted as such with his postgame remarks.
It's hard to envision a team this talented going through such a brutal slump, which is why Ohtani sounded so deflated. With that being said, if there's any team capable of turning it around, it's this one.
Dodgers should still be feared despite recent slump
It's never fun to go through a bad stretch, especially when you lose first place in the division as a result of it, but this Dodgers team is still horrifying. Guys like Betts and Freeman are bound to turn things around. The rotation, especially now with Ohtani able to go five innings when he takes the mound and with both Tyler Glsnow and Blake Snell healthy, should be better. The bullpen, especially with guys like Tanner Scott, Kirby Yates and Michael Kopech expected to return sometime in August, should be better.
Ultimately, now, it's about the talented team that everyone was (and frankly still are) afraid of, stepping up and doing their part. When right, the Dodgers are the clear-cut best team on the planet. When not, they struggle to defeat an Angels team that hasn't finished above .500 in a decade, causing Ohtani to have more Tungsten Arm O'Doyle moments.
It sounds like the Dodgers are doing the right things based on what Ohtani said, but they have to do a better job executing. No team should be better suited to execute than the reigning champs. Doing so in their upcoming weekend series against the San Diego Padres could give the Dodgers first place back, and have Ohtani feeling much better.