ANAHEIM >> As Shohei Ohtani continues to do drills in the outfield and at first base — which the Angels asked him to do — the idea of becoming a position player remains just a vague possibility to him.
“I’m focused on pitching,” Ohtani said though his interpreter on Friday. “That’s the plan for now.”
Ohtani had not spoken to the media since he began working out in the field, which prompted speculation that the Angels were at least preparing for the possibility that Ohtani would no longer be a pitcher.
Ohtani is not pitching because of a forearm strain, which was said to be a relatively minor injury but still one that required too much time to be worth rehabbing during this truncated season.
A couple weeks ago, he started taking some ground balls at first and fly balls in the outfield, although he still isn’t really throwing. Ohtani said he’s not sure exactly what the end game is for the work.
“They never actually told me when (he could play a position) exactly,” Ohtani said. “But they told me they wanted me to get some reps under my belt and be prepared.”
Since Ohtani first joined the Angels in 2018, there has been no serious talk of him playing a position in the field, because the team felt he had enough on his plate pitching and hitting.
Apparently two arm injuries have prompted the Angels to at least plant the seeds for a backup plan.
Ohtani did play the outfield during his early years in Japan, but he stopped. Asked on Friday why, he said: “I can’t really tell you, but maybe I wasn’t too good at it.”
That being said, Ohtani said “I feel I could play the outfield right now. Practice is different than playing in games, but I would give it my best.”
Ohtani still isn’t cleared to throw with any velocity, so playing the outfield now is not on the table. At the moment, the most pressing issue is that Ohtani hasn’t been hitting. He came into Friday’s game hitting .189 with a .670 OPS. Against lefties, he was hitting hitting .143 (5 for 35).
“I’m just trying to grind and get better every day,” Ohtani said. “That’s where I’m at.”
CLOSER SITUATION
A day after Felix Peña picked up his first save with the Angels, Manager Joe Maddon said that Peña and Ty Buttrey will split the closer duties.
“Nobody’s going to be labeled ‘the closer,’” Maddon said. “We’re just gonna try to match it up late as well as we can, based on availability, and with Felix, I want to get him on their best hitters late.”
Peña had a 1.86 ERA heading into Friday’s game, having made the steady climb from being a long reliever to pitching the highest leverage spots.
A WEIRD SITUATION
On Saturday the Angels and Astros will play a doubleheader, with both games being scheduled for seven innings. The Astros will be the home team in the second game, so they’ll bat last.
Those type of nontraditional situations have become commonplace in this unprecedented year, with Major League Baseball scrambling to reschedule as many games as possible into a tight timeframe.
Unlike most of the rescheduled games, which were the result of coronavirus-related postponements, this is is the makeup of a game postponed because of Hurricane Laura’s impending arrival in Houston in August.
Griffin Canning will start the first game for the Angels and they’ll have a bullpen game in the second game. Maddon said he won’t know who will start until after the first game.
ALSOFranklin Barreto got the start in left field on Friday night, his first major league game in outfield. He played the outfield a little in the minors. The Angels want to explore whether Barreto could be a super utility player, beyond just being a utility infielder. “Part of his resume suggests he’s going to be able to play the outfield, so we’ll get him out there,” Maddon said. “We’ll see how it all looks.”…
Maddon said so far he’s gotten no indication from general manager Billy Eppler that first-round draft pick Reid Detmers is on the radar to pitch in the majors in September. “I’m not saying he won’t, but I’ve not had that conversation at all,” Maddon said. “Not even once. So under those circumstances, I would think probably not.”
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