Dave Roberts cracks door open for Shohei Ohtani making a bigger impact in postseason debut

Despite the run that Francisco Lindor has been on for months now, the NL MVP frontrunner has been clear from the moment that the 2024 campaign began. It's Shohei Ohtani's award to lose.

Ohtani enters Friday's action slashing .292/.375/.617 with 47 home runs, 104 RBI, and 48 stolen bases. He's on pace to be the first player in MLB history with 50 home runs and 50 stolen bases in a single season, which is just astonishing.

The one thing holding Ohtani back from winning his third MVP award is the fact that he has been a DH only. He has not had to wear a glove at all during a game and has not thrown a single pitch. That won't change in the regular season, but Los Angeles Dodgers manager Dave Roberts just opened the door to the possibility of Ohtani pitching in the postseason.

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Shohei Ohtani might make bigger impact in first-ever postseason

Somehow, once the Dodgers do clinch a postseason spot, this will be Ohtani's first-ever chance to play in October. He spent six seasons with the Los Angeles Angels, a team that couldn't even finish .500 with the best player on the planet, but has seen a good amount of personal and team success in his debut season with the Dodgers.

Ohtani being as good as he has been as a hitter and base runner makes him extremely valuable, as evidenced by the fact that he's the current NL MVP front runner, but as we all know, he has even more upside. Ohtani, when healthy, is one of the best pitchers on the planet. He might be ready to take the ball come October according to Roberts.

"If things line up and there's a need and the game, his body, everything is telling us that it makes sense in that situation, great. And it would be storybook... Shohei is on board with continuing his rehab process, and I wouldn't put it past him to have an eye on that, and we'll just see how it plays out."

From what Roberts had to say, it might not be likely that Ohtani will pitch in October, but he isn't ruling it out. Ohtani seems to be doing his best to be prepared for it, and if he is medically cleared, the Dodgers might just be willing to let him pitch in the right moment of any given game.

The Dodgers might already be the favorites to not only win the NL, but the World Series. FanGraphs happens to give them 20.5 percent odds of winning the World Series as of this writing. Getting anything from Ohtani from the mound would seemingly improve those odds even further.