lefties) that ranked fifth among qualified hitters. Let’s start with the basics, offense first: Ohtani, who turned 27 in July, batted. With a leadoff homer and two walks on Sunday, Ohtani closed the book on his singular campaign, allowing us to size up his exquisite stats in their final form. Ohtani’s exploits as a full-time hitter and roughly full-time pitcher prompted comparisons to pre-integration greats such as Babe Ruth, Bullet Rogan, and Martín Dihigo, but no major leaguer-let alone a major leaguer facing something close to current competition-has ever combined power hitting, power pitching, and speed at the level and volume that Ohtani did in 2021. All of which means that even though MLB’s postseason is starting on Tuesday, Shohei Ohtani’s season is already over.Įarly exit notwithstanding, 2021 was and always will be the year of two-way Ohtani. Despite dousing their run-differential-defying division rival’s hopes of an elusive playoff appearance, the Angels finished 77-85, giving them their sixth consecutive losing record and fourth consecutive fourth-place finish in the AL West. The Angels were eliminated from postseason contention on September 21, but they posed successfully as spoilers over the regular season’s closing weekend, downing the Mariners 7-3 in Game 162 to take two of three from the M’s. Just not, you know, playoff implications for them. Amid MLB’s anticlimactic tiebreaker tease on Sunday, the Los Angeles Angels played a game with playoff implications.
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