LOS ANGELES (AP) — Shohei Ohtani made his 30th home run in Dodger blue a memorable one.
The superstar slugger drove a cutter from Boston Red Sox pitcher Kutter Crawford 473 feet over the bleachers at Dodger Stadium during the fifth inning of Sunday’s game.
Ohtani’s blast was one of six homers by the Dodgers in a 9-6 victory.
“Yes, and at a good angle,” Ohtani said through an interpreter when asked if he got all of it.
According to fans in the area, the ball sailed between the pavilion roof and an advertisement sign in right-center field, but it cleared the concourse and landed on the walkway in the ballpark plaza.
“I was looking but I really couldn’t see where it went,” Ohtani said. “Everybody was like kind of semi-impressed.”
Ohtani’s homer came after Austin Barnes’ solo shot. It was the seventh time this season the Dodgers hit back-to-back home runs. Four have involved Ohtani.
“No, I don’t think so,” Crawford said when asked if anyone had hit a longer homer off him. “I left a few pitches over the middle of the plate and they didn’t miss.”
Ohtani just missed becoming the second Dodgers player and sixth overall to clear the pavilion roof and hit a ball completely out of Dodger Stadium, which opened in 1962.
Los Angeles slugger Mike Piazza did it on Sept. 21, 1997, against the Colorado Rockies.
The others were Pittsburgh Pirates Hall of Famer Willie Stargell (1969 and ‘73), St. Louis’ Mark McGwire (1999), Miami’s Giancarlo Stanton (2015) and San Diego’s Fernando Tatís Jr. (2021).
Ohtani is hoping to join Piazza on that list soon.
“That’s what I hope. I think I’m going to have a lot more opportunities to do so. So definitely looking forward to one of those,” he said.
According to MLB Statcast, it was tied for the third-longest homer in the majors this season. San Francisco’s Jorge Soler had a 478-foot shot Sunday at Coors Field in Colorado. That supplanted Ohtani’s 476-foot drive in Colorado on June 18.
Seven of Ohtani’s 30 homers this season have gone at least 450 feet. The 116.7 mph exit velocity marked Ohtani’s third hardest-hit ball this season.
“Gosh, he just never ceases to amaze. You look at how far that ball went and how hot it came off the bat, it’s just hard to fathom somebody hitting a baseball like that,” Dodgers manager Dave Roberts said. “He just does things it seems like every night that people just can’t do.”
Ohtani became the first NL player to reach 30 homers this season. Aaron Judge leads the majors with 35.
It is the fourth straight season in which Ohtani has homered at least 30 times. His career high is 46 in 2021 with the Los Angeles Angels, when he won the first of his two AL MVP awards.
“I was starting to sit down thinking about (the next inning) and then, boom! Shohei is unbelievable. I usually don’t miss any of his at-bats because it’s fun to watch,” Barnes said.
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