What will it take for Ohtani to win his first Cy Young Award?

When Shohei Ohtani was in high school in Iwate, Japan, he wrote down a list of life goals.

As you might imagine, many of them had to do with baseball. And in nine Major League seasons so far, he’s already produced a body of work that is unmatched in the game’s history as a superstar on the mound and at the plate.

He’s a four-time MVP -- one of two players in MLB history to win more than three MVP honors -- a five-time All-Star, a four-time Silver Slugger Award winner, the 2025 National League Championship Series MVP and a two-time World Series champion.

But there’s one major accolade that has eluded the great Ohtani, and he wants it -- bad: the Cy Young Award.

On his high school list, he penciled in a goal of winning that honor by age 22. That was a lofty aspiration, even for the supremely talented Ohtani. And although he’s been tremendous on the mound, he hasn’t yet been voted the top pitcher in his league.

So far this season, Ohtani has been brilliant as a pitcher. Over nine starts heading into Wednesday's start in Arizona, he owns a microscopic 0.82 ERA. And yet, given his competition and the fact that he pitches once every six days instead of every five, many would not consider him the man to beat in what is shaping up to be a very intriguing NL Cy Young race.

What would Ohtani likely need by the end of the 2026 campaign in order to finally cross “Cy Young Award” off his list?

An ERA below 2.00

Can Ohtani finish with an ERA under 2.00 over a full season? He’ll likely need to if he’s going to compensate for pitching fewer innings than counterparts like Phillies left-hander Cristopher Sánchez (1.47 ERA over 79 1/3 innings), Brewers phenom Jacob Misiorowski (1.65 ERA and an incredible 39.6% strikeout rate) and reigning NL Cy Young winner Paul Skenes of the Pirates (2.89 ERA over 65 1/3 innings).

So, will Ohtani be able to sustain what he’s done so far in the ERA department? It's not likely, but who could? The lowest ERA for a qualified starter since the mound was lowered to its current height in 1969 is Dwight Gooden’s 1.53 over 35 starts for the Mets in 1985.

Much will depend on how Ohtani’s competition performs, of course, but assuming he’ll need an ERA under 2.00, what does the quality of contact against him so far indicate about whether his current 0.82 mark withstands a look under the hood?

Ohtani’s expected ERA over the 55 innings he's pitched so far this season, based on quality of opponents’ contact, is 2.38 (his FIP is 2.48). That’s still great, placing him within the top 5% of all qualified pitchers. But it’s not 0.82. And something that has been uncharacteristic of Ohtani of late, which he seemed visibly frustrated about in his last outing, is an inability to locate consistently.

The command issues in his start against the Rockies last week, in which he walked a season-high four and had a season-low 56% strike rate, prompted Ohtani to say he “just really couldn’t find it” despite tossing six no-hit frames.

If Ohtani does “find it,” look out. You don’t want to see what a locked-in Ohtani can do if you’re an opposing batter, especially given what he’s doing right now despite not being at his very best. And to win that elusive Cy Young trophy, he’ll need to get locked in and stay that way the rest of the season.

A K rate above 30%

Ohtani’s career strikeout rate as a pitcher is 31.1%. So far in 2026, he’s below that, at 28.6%. With Misiorowski demolishing velocity-related records in a performance unlike anything we’ve seen before, Ohtani will need to find a way to keep himself somewhat close in that department.

While it’s unlikely he’ll keep up with the raw number of strikeouts Misiorowski, Sánchez and Skenes will accumulate since he’ll make fewer starts as part of a six-man rotation, if Ohtani can increase his strikeout rate back above 30%, he’ll be in better shape down the stretch in the Cy Young race.

By comparison, Sánchez and Skenes each currently have a strikeout rate of 29.4%. So if Ohtani can get back up over 30%, he could at least have a small advantage over those two in that category.

Ohtani's two primary weapons have been among the best pitches in baseball this season -- his four-seam fastball is tied with Kevin Gasuman's for the fourth-best pitch in MLB, at a run value of +10. And Ohtani's sweeper has been the best sweeper in the Majors (+9 run value) and has generated a 39% whiff rate.

At least 170 innings

This is the big one. With Ohtani starting every six days to manage his workload as he also serves as the Dodgers' everyday designated hitter, he’s at a disadvantage in the Cy Young race because of the sheer volume of innings his competitors can amass.

Through nine outings this season, Ohtani is averaging just over six innings per start. Pitching every six days or so, he’ll probably make somewhere around 27 starts by the end of the regular season. If he continues to pitch at his current innings-per-start pace, that would total around 165 innings.

And that’s a fair target for Ohtani if he wants to have a real shot at the Cy Young Award. It would take 162 innings for him to qualify for the ERA title, which he would surely want to do. But he’ll need to stay healthy and not skip or push back any starts to get there.

Ohtani’s career-high in innings pitched for a season is 166, which he reached over 28 starts for the Angels in 2022 -- the only year in which he finished in the top five of Cy Young balloting (he finished fourth in the AL). Notably, the starting pitcher with the fewest innings during a full season in a Cy Young Award-winning campaign was the Brewers’ Corbin Burnes, who threw 167 in 2021.

To be safe, Ohtani probably wants to shoot for at least 170 innings in 2026.

Will he do it?

Well, he might need some help from the hitters facing Sánchez, Misiorowski and Skenes. But if there’s one thing we know about Ohtani, it’s to never doubt him. He’s too good, and he’s proven time and again that when we think we’ve seen him do it all, we’re wrong.