Another rollercoaster Roki Sasaki start has Dodgers fans riddled with mixed feelings

Roki Sasaki's first spring training start was not the turn of the page that Dodgers fans wanted it to be. On Feb. 25, he took the mound against the Diamondbacks and promptly gave up up three runs on a three hits in the first inning. He came in for the second, but Dave Roberts had seen enough after Sasaki gave up his second walk of the afternoon.

A week later, he took the ball against the Guardians ... and things proceeded to go very, very poorly. Sasaki's first inning went: four-pitch walk (on a challenged call), single, walk, and then a grand slam with zero outs. He walked another batter before Roberts had seen enough and pulled him.

Cue immediate panic from Dodgers fans — panic that isn't unfounded. Shouldn't we be seeing a new and improved pitcher from the one that already set expectations low for himself after 2025?

But Sasaki came back in for the second after Double-A pitcher Wyatt Crowell got the Dodgers out of the first ... and he proceeded to throw a clean, 10-pitch inning with two strikeouts. He induced three easy outs in third, too.

Roki Sasaki's second spring training start was terrible, then great — and it's confusing Dodgers fans

Sasaki was all over the place in the first inning and was missing terribly on his arm-side. It still wasn't totally there in the second or even the third, but he got Brayan Rocchio to swing at a nice splitter for his first strikeout of the afternoon. There were still a couple of pitches he just got lucky on — namely, a meatball straight down the heart of the plate that David Fry flew out on.

The Dodgers have always been insistent that Sasaki is an unfinished product who needs and will get development from the team — but that doesn't match up incredibly well against Sasaki's more independent personality, and he's reportedly been resistant to help.

There are still kinks to work out. He's developing and tweaking a couple of pitches; he's trying to regain his velocity after a worrying dip in his last year in NPB carried over to the majors.

Maybe this is just what he needs. Maybe he needs to fail spectacularly and then figure out his adjustments. But let's just hope that he gets as spectacular a failure as this particular first inning out of his system before the Dodgers actually have to put him on the mound in games that matter.