Shohei Ohtani will not pitch in World Baseball

Dodgers supervisor Dave Roberts cleared up one key query heading into spring training.

Shohei Ohtani will not pitch for Team Japan in the World Baseball Classic in March, Roberts told reporters during Saturday’s annual DodgerFest at Dodger Stadium. The supervisor added it was Ohtani’s choice and the Dodgers would have allowed him to do so if he had needed to.

“I wasn’t surprised,” Roberts said. “I can’t even say I was relieved. Understanding what he did last year, understanding what he had to go through, to then how best to prepare himself for ’26 to do both, it just seemed like the right decision.”

Ohtani said in November he would take part in the WBC but did not signal at the time whether or not he would pitch. When Team Japan’s roster was announced Monday, supervisor Hirokazu Ibata did not say if Ohtani would pitch, only saying they might get a better sense in spring training.

And on Saturday, Ohtani — who spoke to reporters before Roberts did — said he was still uncertain if he would pitch in the WBC and it will rely on how he feels as he started ramping up to pitch over the next few weeks. The expectation going into the season, he told reporters, had been he would give you the option to pitch without restrictions from the start for the Dodgers.

“I’m not going to manage him differently as far as each outing,” Roberts said. “There’s certainly going to be extra time, it’s not a five-day, six-day rotation. So there’s going to be rest in between. But outside of that, it’s not going to be the two-inning, three-inning [start], he’s just going to be used as a normal pitcher.”

In the 2023 WBC, Ohtani received match most helpful participant with a .435 batting average and 1.86 ERA, serving to Japan to the title. He punctuated the event with his memorable strikeout of his then-Angels teammate Mike Trout for the ultimate out in the championship recreation. But 5 months later, Ohtani was pulled from a home start against the Cincinnati Reds for what finally was revealed to be a torn UCL.

Ohtani had his second profession Tommy John surgical procedure in September and did not return to pitching until last June with the Dodgers.

MLB gamers like Ohtani and teammate Yoshinobu Yamamoto are anticipated to be part of Team Japan for exhibition video games on March 2. Japan will open WBC play on March 6 against Taiwan.