​On July 8, Shohei Ohtani delivered a memorable moment at Dodger Stadium, glancing at a hanging sink of a sinker in the opening frame, waving his bat through the strike zone, and springing to life like a churning, perturbed python as he buried a middle-middle offering for his 300th career home run. The 409-foot solo shot came in the bottom of the first inning of Los Angeles’ 4-3 loss to the Colorado Rockies on Tuesday. Ohtani finished 1-for-4 with a walk and a strikeout, but his blast stood out as the defining highlight of the night.
With his 300th homer, Ohtani became the first player born in Japan to reach the three-hundred-homer milestone in MLB history. He has hit 129 homers over the past three seasons with the Dodgers, adding to the 171 he accumulated during his first six seasons with the Los Angeles Angels. “It was squared up, got out in a hurry, and 300, he got there pretty quickly for us,” Dodgers manager Dave Roberts said, speaking to reporters. “I just marvel at him every day. So, 300 is a big number.”
The Dodgers designated hitter flicked a watchful eye toward the field in the moment, and the ball traveled over the left-center wall as the video peered down. The big swing came off Rockies starter Michael Lorenzen, who opened the game by issuing a walk to Ohtani but then settled in to attack the Dodgers lineup. Lorenzen’s first two pitches missed the mark, and after a middle-of-the-plate sinker at 93.3 mph, Ohtani drove it 112.2 mph to left-center, sending the ball into the stands for the milestone homer.
As the game progressed, Ohtani would eventually score again in the bottom of the fifth, when Los Angeles tallied on a bases-loaded walk by Lorenzen. Left fielder Jake McCarthy contributed an RBI groundout in the sixth for Colorado’s first run, and Alex Freeland answered with an RBI single in the bottom of that frame for the Dodgers, though they wouldn’t plate any more runs the rest of the way.
The Rockies finally surged in the eighth inning, scratching across three runs. One of the runs came on a fielding error by Dodgers shortstop Miguel Rojas, and a sacrifice bunt from McCarthy tied the game at 3-3. Another Dodgers miscue in the same sequence allowed Colorado to take the lead for good.
Rockies reliever Juan Mejia silence the Dodgers in the eighth by retiring them in order. In the ninth, Colorado reliever Jordan Romano began the frame by allowing a Freeman single and a walk to keep the inning alive, but he then retired Ohtani, Andy Pages, and Dodgers first baseman Freddie Freeman to seal the victory for Colorado.
Images from the night captured Ohtani’s accomplishment: a moment in which the designated hitter watched as the ball cleared the wall, and teammates surrounded him in celebration as he reached the 300-homer mark with a flourish. The Dodgers, meanwhile, left the field reflecting on a night of heroic swings and costly errors that both defined Ohtani’s historic milestone and underscored a familiar wrinkle in the Dodgers’ season.