This is the problem with superteams: when the stars stop looking like stars, everybody notices immediately. Mookie Betts has now said the quiet part out loud about Shohei Ohtani, and the timing could not be more awkward for the Los Angeles Dodgers. Ohtani is slumping badly in the postseason, and Dave Roberts is reportedly considering whether to pull him from the lineup for Game 3 of the NLCS on Wednesday.
Betts did not dress it up. When asked about Ohtani’s struggles, he said, “It’s hard to see,” and added that Ohtani is working and that the Dodgers are hoping he gets out of it. That is the reality here: one of baseball’s biggest names is searching for answers while his team is staring at a decision that would have sounded unthinkable a few weeks ago.
A huge regular season has vanished from view
The contrast is brutal. Through the first 121 games of the season through Aug. 18, Ohtani was slashing.294/.390/.558 with 30 home runs. That is the version of him the Dodgers built around. That is the version that helped define a lineup capable of winning World Series championships in 2024 and 2025 with Betts and Ohtani at the top.
But baseball does not care about reputation for long. On Sept. 8, injuries to Ohtani’s biceps, knee and neck sent him to the injured list, and his final 18 regular-season games fell off sharply to.157/.289/.214. The Dodgers then hoped the wild-card round time off would give him enough recovery to reset. Instead, the postseason has only made the problem louder.
The postseason numbers are not softening the debate
Through six postseason games, Ohtani is 3-for-20 with three walks and seven strikeouts. He has no extra-base hits and no RBI. That is not a cold stretch that can be brushed aside with a shrug. For a player expected to shape the biggest October games, it is a glaring absence.
That is why the reported conversation around Game 3 matters. If Dave Roberts does decide to change the lineup in Los Angeles on Wednesday, it would not just be a tactical tweak. It would be a statement that performance, not prestige, is running the room. In October, that is the only standard that counts.
Betts is right to be concerned
Betts’ comments were measured, but they carried real weight. “He’s working, and hopefully he gets out of it,” Betts said. “We know he’s working. Yeah, that’s a big one. We need him for sure.” That is the language of a teammate who understands both the stakes and the strain.
And that is exactly why this story has teeth. The Dodgers do not need sympathy. They need production. Ohtani’s slump is not some minor side issue tucked into the margins of a long postseason run. It is becoming one of the defining pressures on a team that was supposed to be built to handle these moments.
Maybe Ohtani turns it around. Maybe the next swing changes the whole mood. But right now, the numbers are too thin, the context is too heavy, and the Dodgers are plainly considering whether the lineup has to move on without him, at least for one night. That is what makes Mlb Games Tonight feel less like a routine check-in and more like a test of how much faith a contender can afford to keep spending.
