Yamamoto Struggles in First Inning Again
It seems like a recurring theme.
After a single into the right field, he strolled home on a two-out hit, even picking up an extra run due to a wild pitch.
Yoshinobu Yamamoto started Monday’s game against the Houston Astros with trouble, allowing runs in the first inning for the third time in four starts.
Though the Dodgers bounced back to win 8-3 at Daikin Park, the two early runs he gave up highlighted a persistent issue that has plagued him since he arrived from Japan two years ago.
Across 55 regular season games over three seasons in the majors, Yamamoto has an ERA sitting at 4.60.
“The first inning was really tough,” he admitted to reporters in Japanese. “I need to work harder to figure it out, get it organized in my mind, and make improvements.”
His struggles haven’t faded this season, with a first-inning ERA of 7.71. Interestingly, if you disregard that first inning entirely, his overall ERA would drop to 2.20.
Yamamoto isn’t the only Dodgers pitcher facing these issues; Emmett Sheehan has also struggled in the first inning, posting a staggering 12.00 ERA within just one inning.
In contrast, other pitchers like Shohei Ohtani and Roki Sasaki have managed to keep their first innings clean, with much lower ERAs.
Reflecting on his performance against the Astros, Yamamoto mentioned, “Maybe I overthrew a bit. That part was tricky. I was trying to find the right balance of force, and the ball just got away from me.”
From the second to the sixth innings, he tightened up, limiting the Astros to just three hits and allowing one run. He replaced Kyle Hart at the top of the seventh and even notched a season-high eight strikeouts.
Frustratingly, he has only gone beyond six innings in two of his seven starts this year. “The outcomes we’ve had are tied to those six innings I pitched,” he noted, expressing his determination to improve.
Yamamoto has a record of 3 wins to 2 losses, along with a 3.09 ERA, but it feels like he’s in a slight slump. He faced a rough patch early last season as well. Osamu Yada, his longtime trainer, had mentioned during spring training that such a phase might reoccur.
Yada commented on how Yamamoto pushes himself “to complete exhaustion” during winter workouts, aiming to hit his peak later in the season.
Interestingly, last October, his first-inning issues disappeared almost entirely; he only allowed a run in the first inning once during the five postseason games he started.
