In his first Angel Stadium start, Shohei Ohtani and his video game pitches were perfect into the seventh
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Every time Shohei Ohtani has taken the field at Angel Stadium so far this season, it's been a big deal. He homered in his first three home games as the team's designated hitter, which is pretty ridiculous, and on Sunday he took the mound for his first pitching start at his new home ballpark.
To say he didn't disappoint wouldn't be accurate. He was so dazzling, his pitches baffled the A's so thoroughly that Ohtani took a perfect-game bid into the seventh inning. Throughout the afternoon, he had some definite swagger out there on the hill:
Sunday marked pitcher Ohtani's second start, exactly one week since his first. That happened to come against the A's up in Oakland, where the 23-year-old put on a clinic of totally unfair strikeout pitches and changeups that dropped off the table faster than your favorite gravity-defying ride at an amusement park.
Would it surprise you to find out that Ohtani did the same again on Sunday?
Against many of the same A's hitters who challenged him last week, he just found a way to change speeds (from 99-mph fastballs to mid-80s offspeed stuff, nearly interchangeably) effectively enough to not allow any hits or baserunners until Marcus Semien lined a clean single in the seventh inning:
Ohtani's final line: 7 innings, one hit, one walk, 12 strikeouts in the Angels' 6-1 win. Unfair.
His teammate, Mike Trout -- who had a great game of his own, going 2-3 with a home run -- is pretty impressed with Ohtani too:
So far, so nearly perfect for Ohtani in his young MLB career. Good luck hitters (and pitchers!).