Shohei Ohtani says he will pitch for the Dodgers in 2027. MLB.com's Brian Murphy quotes him saying he 'definitely' plans to, and notes that injuries kept him off the mound for the last three months of the season. Yahoo Sports quotes him, in Japanese, saying: 'I intend on doing everything.' Reddit's r/baseball thread adds the part he did not settle. Asked about offseason surgery, he said it is 'hard to tell.'
The reporting disagrees on how reassuring the comments were. Yahoo's second piece says the intent was expected but 'how he said it was worrisome.' Its summary doesn't say what drew that reading, and we can't tell from the excerpt. Eric Stephen of True Blue LA puts it more plainly: there was a lot of uncertainty around Ohtani for the last two-plus months of 2026, and the offseason has brought little clarity. He writes that the left knee issues date back to June and first shut down his pitching after his July 3 start. Only Stephen's excerpt gives that date and the June origin. The other summaries say only that injuries kept him off the mound.
The pitching he is promising to bring back was very good. Our data has him at 14 starts, 8-2 with a 1.79 ERA, 95 strikeouts and 26 walks in 85.2 innings. Opponents hit .180 against him. That 14-start season is also all of it. The knee cost him the rest of the year on the mound, so the offseason question is about durability as much as talent.
His bat carried on, with less power than last year. He hit .275 with 30 home runs, 81 RBI and an .889 OPS in 139 games. In 2025 he hit 55 home runs with a 1.014 OPS. The knee issue could be part of that gap, but none of the reporting says so, and we won't assume it.
Yahoo's Jack Baer frames the Dodgers' side of it. They don't need Ohtani to pitch to make the playoffs or win the NL West, he writes, but they 'definitely need him healthy for the postseason.' Los Angeles finished 100-62 and first in the NL West. The immediate picture is less comfortable. The Dodgers have lost three straight to Milwaukee, 7-4 on Oct. 12 and 6-2 and 6-4 on Oct. 14 and 15. The next game is at Milwaukee on Sunday, Oct. 18, with another there on Oct. 19.
100-621st in NL WestStreak W3
The open decision is the surgery. Ohtani has said it is hard to tell, and none of these outlets reports a timeline or a decision. Whether he needs an operation will set how the 2027 pitching plan looks, and nothing we have says when that will be known.
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