Shohei Ohtani Faces Pressure Amid Dodgers Playoff Slump

I give Ohtani a lot of credit for speaking to the media, you know, with his translator, meeting with the media as well. But what was the purpose? Why now? What was the purpose? He didn't have to do this. But I think that, in a way, like, I'm going to guess he's sitting down with Dave Roberts, and Dave Roberts is like, listen, you know, like, we're going to defer to you. You've earned it. You've won two MVPs. But we think it's best to stop. You know? Like, that could have been the conversation. And then Ohtani's like, no, I want to play. And Roberts is probably like, no, we really don't want you to play. And Otani's like, look, then this is on me. I'll go meet with the media. I'll go tell them what's going on. I want everyone to understand what's happening. I want to tell them I'm going to be able to bounce back. And if something goes sour, then you put that all on me. And Dave Roberts is probably like, hey, what are we going to do? this guy has been the best player in baseball going on four or five years now he's a two-time MVP how am i going to tell this guy no even in the NLCS so the decision is sort of taken out of his hands and there's very few players that are above their teams or above like let's just say organizations and Ohtani happens to be one i don't know how many honestly i don't even know how many how many others there are maybe mike trout probably can call his own shots with the Angels he's been at it so long he's a future Hall of Famer probably could do whatever he wants but we're talking about a handful of players right now going in baseball that can say hey i want to play and you got to put me in that's the only thing i can think of here because had he not met uh with media today and i'm not big on like reading into that sort of stuff but had he not done that i think that that would be a joke i i think they would be like all right that's it call it a day uh but the fact that he did that probably on his own was to to take some pressure off the Dodgers to say hey look here's the reasoning behind my struggle behind my struggle it's kind of crazy that uh that he did because the all we heard after they lost game two was are they gonna bench Ohtani like a bench Ohtani i mean it was every article it was that was the talk of the entire thing and then Dave Roberts having to answer questions about it Dave Roberts says he's not healthy it's the knee it's this it's that we all know we can see that that's not the problem but at what point Craig does it become can't be about you at this point Ohtani if you were 80 percent we'd be you know what I mean but it is clear especially tonight at home if he let's say again 0 for 4 a couple of strikeouts Craig what are we doing for game four look I mean I don't I don't I don't know I don't know you're right it's a very fair question to ask again if they're down 3-0 I mean this kid DePaula is not a slouch like he's not a nobody right like he like their their options are thin it's not great but the paula is not a zero it's it's not like they have a minor league guy to come in and play for him it's not the case but i i think i i maybe that's part of the conversation too joe where they'll give you one more day to figure it out