Ohtani is heating up despite lingering distractions off field

MINNEAPOLIS >> Much has changed for Shohei Ohtani this season.

He's with a new team. He's a married man. And, he doesn't have Ippei Mizuhara at his side for the first time since Ohtani came to the United States.

Mizuhara was not only Ohtani's interpreter from the time he signed with the Angels in 2018. He also became a close friend and right-hand man for six years. All that changed last month when Mizuhara's gambling problem came to light. He was fired by the Dodgers amid accusations of stealing money from Ohtani to pay his gambling debts.

“It's only been a couple weeks since then, and it's not like I've been doing much aside from just being at the hotel and at home,” Ohtani said of Mizuhara's absence from his life, this time with Will Ireton serving as interpreter. “I'm just really grateful, thankful, that the team and the personnel has supported me throughout the process.”

Dodgers manager Dave Roberts said it might be helpful to no longer have Mizuhara acting as “a buffer” between Ohtani and his teammates and the coaching staff. He says the first weeks of the season have been a learning opportunity.

“I think each day we're learning more (about Ohtani),” Roberts said “I think each day he's becoming more comfortable. He's laughing a ton. He's asking questions.”

The biggest question still lingering around Ohtani is about the outcome of investigations by federal authorities as well as MLB into the situation with Mizuhara.

MLB commissioner Rob Manfred said on a New York radio show on Sunday that the investigation would be “relatively short” and praised Ohtani for his public statement regarding the situation given on March 25, calling it “really credible, really transparent.”

“But I think it's incumbent upon us just to make sure that we can verify the story that's there to give our fans absolute assurance about the integrity of the game,” Manfred said.

In the meantime, Ohtani plays on, seemingly unbothered by the investigations.

“Regardless of whatever happens off the field, my ability to be able to play baseball hasn't changed,” he said Monday. “It is my job to make sure that I play to the best of my abilities.”

After a relatively slow start (a .242 batting average and no home runs in his first eight games), Ohtani has heated up. He hit his first home run as a Dodger at home on Wednesday and is on an 11-for-22 tear through Monday's game with multiple hits in each of his past five games and eight extrabase hits overall (four doubles, one triple and three home runs). His oppositefield home run in Minnesota on Monday was the 174th of his career, one short of Hideki Matsui's MLB record for a Japanese-born player.

“Just made several adjustments in the cage,” Ohtani said. “I just worked on some drills to improve my mechanics.”

One of those drills was hitting off a tee using a bat with a flat barrel like a cricket bat. Ohtani said he did that during the rain delay in Chicago on Sunday.

“We've got a bunch of toys in our toy bags and hitters bags,” assistant hitting coach Aaron Bates said. “I think he just picked it up and started using it. And then, yeah, he got some hits yesterday — so then it works, I guess.”

Bates said Ohtani might have tried the cricket bat before a game once (Ohtani rarely takes batting practice on the field before games) but it was during the rain delay Sunday that he got into it.

“Everyone was delirious at that point. When it's a rain delay, kind of messing around and stuff,” Bates said. “And then I think all the guys started using it after he did. It's just one of those things. It does a lot of good things too. But I think it's more so just a lighthearted thing.”

Bullpen add

The Dodgers officially added right-hander Connor Brogdon to the active roster Monday and sent righthander Gus Varland back to Triple-A Oklahoma City.

Brogdon, 29, was acquired from the Philadelphia Phillies over the weekend in a trade for minorleague left-hander Benony Robles.