Dodgers' Shohei Ohtani Walks Off Mound With Bloody Finger as Struggles Continue

Los Angeles Dodgers two-way star Shohei Ohtani was dealing through four innings on Wednesday against the Tampa Bay Rays.

Ohtani had allowed just two hits with zero walks through four shutout innings. He needed just 50 pitches to dismantle the Tampa Bay lineup.

Then came the fifth inning.

Ohtani allowed four runs on five hits in the fifth inning. He also walked one and didn't record a strikeout.

After getting the third out and bringing an end to the disastrous inning, Ohtani's finger was seen bleeding on his right hand.

Shohei Ohtani is dealing with a noticeable bloody blister on the middle finger of his pitching hand.

He's continuing to pitch through it and has said it isn't impacting him.

At the same time, his last two starts have been his two worst of the season.pic.twitter.com/OFDrHNYrut
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Ohtani has been dealing with a blister on the middle finger of his pitching hand for the last month. However, he's said it hasn't bothered him or impacted his pitching.

“No issues with the blisters," Ohtani said last week. "I don’t think it’s been affecting my performance."

Manager Dave Roberts echoed a similar sentiment in the beginning of June.

“There is a little blister. Everyone saw him picking at it a little bit, but I didn’t hear too much about it after the game,” Roberts said a couple weeks ago. “I don’t expect it to affect him going forward.”

With that being said, Ohtani has now endured his worst two starts of the season after being so dominant early in the year.

Through Ohtani's first 10 starts of the season, he allowed a total of just five earned runs. Over his last two starts, he's allowed seven earned runs.

Dodgers' Shohei Ohtani Losing Steam in Cy Young Race

Ohtani now has a 1.47 ERA across 12 starts (73.2 innings) this season. His last two starts have put a major damper on his chances to win the National League Cy Young award this season.

Ohtani already had an uphill battle to climb in the race considering he pitches just once a week and is well behind the NL leaders in innings pitched.

However, with how dominant he was through his first 10 starts, he was making a case to win the award despite the fewer innings.

While Ohtani is still in the midst of a dominant year, he likely needs to be historically great to win the Cy Young award, especially given the other competition in the NL.

Jacob Misiorowski of the Milwaukee Brewers has a 1.34 ERA with 131 strikeouts over 87 innings. Cristopher Sánchez of the Philadelphia Phillies has a 1.82 ERA with 116 strikeouts over 99 innings.

While two starts can't completely ruin Ohtani's chances of winning the award he so covets, they definitely put more pressure on his future outings to be that much more great.

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