This week, the Angels made the call to keep Shohei Ohtani past the MLB trade deadline on August 1 and to develop around him for the rest of the season. They bolstered their roster with a late Wednesday night transaction with the White Sox. Then, on Thursday, Ohtani demonstrated why the Angels wanted to hold on to their phenom.
His performance in both games in LA’s doubleheader sweep of the Tigers was historic, and it was one of the best single days of his Major League Baseball career. On the mound, he threw his first career complete game, while at the plate, he hit a season-high four home runs.
The star player for the Angels is having a career year. He has a 1.070 OPS, 38 homers, and a.185 opponent batting average, all of which are major league bests. He has 148 strikeouts in 111 2/3 innings pitched, and he has already hit the second-most home runs of his career.
It’s possible that his work on Thursday was the crowning achievement of this historic campaign. Ohtani and the Angels face the Tigers twice on Thursday, starting with the first game at 1:10 p.m. Ohtani is retired in order by host Detroit’s All-Star starter Michael Lorenzen in the top of the first inning.
At 2:20 p.m., in the bottom of the fifth inning, Kerry Carpenter hits a line drive to center field. The Tigers’ first batter-hitter against Ohtani. The Angels have a three-run lead right now.
An ode to the pitch clock at 3:26 p.m., when a 6-0 game is over in 2:16. It helps, of course, when one team doesn’t have many runners on base, as the Tigers did. The only hit for Detroit was a single by Carpenter. All three Tigers baserunners that reached through walks against Ohtani were Spencer Torkelson, Matt Vierling, and Zack Short.
At this time in the game, 4:11, Matt Manning will pitch against the Angels. Lorenzen gave up just three runs on the mound, but the team’s offense failed to produce. Manning starts the game by fanning Ohtani and Zach Neto. Ohtani pitched the final pitch of his no-hitter at 4:45 p.m., and he hit his 37th home run of the season just an hour and 19 minutes later. The 107.6 mph exit velocity and 383-foot distance are only estimates. Without Camden Yards, the drive wouldn’t have been worthwhile.
Ohtani hit two more home runs in the fifth inning (5:35). Fifty minutes later, he hits his second home run of the game, this one traveling 435 feet and leaving the bat at 116.9 miles per hour. It looks that he tightened up during the at-bat and had to exit the game as a result. Ohtani finished 2 for 7 at the plate with two home runs and struck out eight batters in a one-hit shutout while walking three in two games. Three times he also hit the wall.
It’s not that Ohtani set a record on Thursday. He made history as the first pitcher in Major League Baseball history to hit a home run in the second game of a doubleheader after throwing a complete game in the first game.
Additionally, however. According to Sarah Langs of MLB, Ohtani is the only player to pitch a shutout and homer twice in the same day since Sonny Siebert on September 2, 1971. According to Langs, he’s only the second player to do both (pitch a full game allowing one or no hits and hit two home runs in the same game) since at least 1900. On June 23, 1971, Rick Wise did both for the Phillies when he pitched a no-hitter and hit two home runs against the Reds.
Ohtani is the first player in Major League Baseball history to homer and pitch a shutout in separate games in a doubleheader, as reported by the Elias Sports Bureau through Langs.