Shohei Ohtani: Start delayed due to traffic on Bay Bridge

Evan Desai

May 19, 2021; Anaheim, California, USA; Los Angeles Angels starting pitcher Shohei Ohtani (17) throws a pitch in the first inning against the Cleveland Indians at Angel Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Robert Hanashiro-USA TODAY Sports

Shohei Ohtani was schedule to make his seventh start on the mound for the LA Angels today.

Instead, Shohei Ohtani was not able to make it to the ballpark in time to complete his preparation process. The reason may suggest that the baseball Gods have something against the LA Angels.

There was an accident on the Bay Bridge, so Ohtani had to ride the BART to get to the stadium. The BART is the ‘Bay Area Rapid Transit.’ It had Ohtani arriving too late to complete his warm-up, and both Kurt Suzuki and Phil Gosselin also had to take the BART. That is the reason they are now not playing today.

There was a transfer issue at the BART as well, which put the nail in the coffin on the original plans for those three.

Ohtani will still be hitting as the DH tonight. Gosselin was originally supposed to handle those duties, but this whole situation has deep effects on what is going on in this game. Patrick Sandoval will be starting on the mound while Ohtani will be batting second.

Sandoval has started two games this year, and sports a 4.96 ERA. Ohtani has a 2.37 ERA in his six starts. It’ll be a downgrade, but Ohtani will at least start on the bump tomorrow.

Drew Butera will take over for Suzuki tonight. He has somehow found a way to hit worse than Suzuki this year, so that’s another downgrade.

The Angels really can’t catch any breaks this season. Anthony Rendon has had his injuries, Mike Trout is out for an extended period of time, and now the higher powers of the baseball universe won’t even allow their players to get to the games on time.

Just when the Angels hop on a nice winning streak, and have their best pitcher starting for them, something completely out of their control has to mount more problems coming into the series for the squad. It’s been a common theme of the season so far.

Evan Desai

Evan Desai has covered MLB with FanSided for 3 years, first as a contributor for FanSided's New York sports publication--Empire Writes Back--and now as the expert at Halo Hangout, the Angels publication for the network. He also runs Reign Of Troy, the USC FanSided publication, and has covered college sports since 2019--most notably USC and UCLA for the Pac-12 Network, University of Arizona and Grand Canyon University for Arizona PBS, and Arizona State University for Sports Illustrated's ASU publication. He has also run the Clippers FanSided publication in the past, Clipperholics, and has made two stops at NBC Sports.