ANAHEIM -- Shohei Ohtani just kept running.
He had just driven a ball into the right-field corner, where it landed fair, but looked like it was going to bounce out of play. Angels right fielder Jo Adell threw his hands up as the ball hit the netting, then dropped back into the field of play.
One run crossed the plate, then another. Ohtani kept motoring around the bases all the while. Adell threw the ball back into the infield, where it trickled toward the plate as Ohtani slid home safely for his first Little League home run in the Major Leagues. The Angels challenged, but to no avail: The umpires gathered and confirmed that the ball had been live the whole time, and the play was scored a triple and E-9.
Then Mookie Betts went back-to-back with a long ball that required no verification as the Dodgers piled on late in an eventual 15-2 rout of the Angels on Saturday night. The Dodgers have won four in a row and could sweep the Anaheim edition of the Freeway Series in Sunday afternoon's finale.
The ball Ohtani hit in the eighth inning remained live according to the universal ground rules for all 30 ballparks: "A live ball (batted, thrown or otherwise) striking any screen or protective netting set on the field facing a wall or railing (e.g., a backstop or protective netting along the first- or third-base lines) and rebounding onto the field is live and in play."
"That was a tough one, obviously," Angels manager Kurt Suzuki said. "Before the nets were down the line, that ball bounces into the stands and it's two bases. But we just challenged, we thought maybe [it] might have hit a fan and it didn't, obviously. So, you know, unfortunate."
Said Ohtani on SportsNet LA, through interpreter Will Ireton: "I didn't know about this netting since when I played here, there wasn't any netting. But I just kept running."
Prior to Ohtani's Little League homer off Alek Manoah in the eighth inning, the Dodgers hadn't done a whole lot of hitting to get on the board. They opened the scoring on Will Smith's first-inning sacrifice fly, then plated five runs on four walks, two hit batsmen and a base hit against starter José Soriano and reliever Chase Silseth in the sixth.
"It was good to see our offense really come to life. Even in that one big inning, I think we only got one hit," manager Dave Roberts said. "But just taking walks when we needed to, and stressing their guy who is their ace right now and throwing the ball really well."
But this Dodgers lineup is capable of a lot of pop, and they provided that late. After Ohtani and Betts keyed a four-run eighth inning, Ohtani brought home another trio of runs on a bases-clearing double as part of a five-run ninth. That gave L.A. a season-high 15 runs, a strong performance for an offense looking to put a recent team-wide slump in the past.
After getting a two-game break from hitting, Ohtani has gone 3-for-8 with three walks. His five RBIs on Saturday were a season high, and his ninth-inning double came off his bat at 111.7 mph, his third-hardest exit velocity this season. But it was the way he hustled to round the bases that gave Roberts some insight about how his two-way superstar is feeling after his chance to reset.
“His effort level going around there for the double initially, and to continue to go -- for me that was the most telling," Roberts said. "I think the bat speed was good. Swings were good. But then the hustle, there’s just more in the tank there.”
The Dodgers had much more than a revitalized Ohtani and offense going their way. Andy Pages thrilled in center field, making a jaw-dropping catch to save a run and preserve a 1-0 lead in the fourth inning. Justin Wrobleski bounced back from allowing a season-high seven runs in his previous start to hold the Angels to two runs across six innings.
Over the course of their four straight wins, the Dodgers' bats have begun to turn a corner following an extended cold spell. And a game like Saturday -- when they scored by almost every possible method -- could be just what they need to right the ship.
"Outside of a wild pitch or a passed ball," Roberts said with a smile, "we kind of touched all bases on that one."