While Shohei Ohtani has been struggling at the plate recently, he’s made opposing hitters look even worst. Wednesday night was arguably his best pitching start of the season with seven scoreless innings and eight strikeouts against the San Francisco Giants.
Perspective is important with Ohtani, who has legitimately had a rough go of it while hitting of late, such that he didn’t hit Wednesday night and won’t hit on Thursday to gain some semblance of rest. But even with his hitting struggles, Ohtani still has a 122 wRC+, making him still a well-above-average hitter, just below his own standards.
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But he’s thriving on the mound. After Wednesday’s performance, Ohtani has a minuscule 0.82 ERA with 50 strikeouts against 11 walks in 44 innings.
Ohtani has led the National League in ERA after all seven of his starts, and led the majors in ERA after five of them, including each of the last three. The only thing keeping him off the leaderboard at times this season is the lack of innings.
Ohtani didn’t pitch until the Dodgers fifth game of the season, got extra time in between then and his second start in order to line up with a team off day the day after said start in Toronto, and even got extra time before Wednesday’s start with Blake Snell inserted into the rotation earlier than planned last weekend.
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So Ohtani has been straddling the line of qualifying for leaderboards, needing at least one inning per team game played. What’s stayed consistent though is his performance, lasting at least six innings in all seven of his starts, including seven innings in each of his last two outings.
After Tuesday’s start he’s up to 44 innings, through 43 Dodgers games.
Of his 44 innings, 38 of them have been scoreless frames, plus single runs in six different innings, two of those tallies unearned. For what it’s worth, even if those other two runs were earned, Ohtani’s updated 1.23 ERA would would still lead the majors, with New York Yankees right-hander Cam Schlitter next-best at 1.35. Ohtani’s 2.17 xERA is second-best in baseball, behind only Pittsburgh Pirates ace Paul Skenes.
Here are the dates Ohtani has led the NL in ERA to date in 2026 (at the end of that day):
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April 1: 0.00 ERA (tied with 7 others)
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April 2: 0.00 ERA (tied with 5 others)
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May 14: 0.82 ERA (also 1st in MLB)
I included May 14 as well because with 44 innings, Ohtani will continue to qualify through Thursday’s game, the Dodgers’ 44th of the season. And nobody is close enough to pass him for the top spot.
Counting his time on the mound last year, Ohtani now has a 1.88 ERA in 21 starts and 91 innings with the Dodgers. Put another way, the man with the top two home-run seasons in franchise history also has the lowest ERA in team history with a minimum of 90 innings.
