ESPN’s bold prediction for Shohei Ohtani is a slight to his Dodgers teammate

ESPN did the thing sports media seems to do when it gets bored: it stared at the most famous player on earth and said, “Let’s make the story bigger.”

In its 2026 bold predictions package, ESPN’s Alden Gonzalez pegged Shohei Ohtani to win the NL Cy Young, leaning hard into the idea that a full, healthy return to two-way dominance finally lets him “assert his dominance as a pitcher” and flip the long-running perception that his pitching trails his hitting.

It’s not some kind of crazy take. If Ohtani is truly back as a regular rotation piece, he’s capable of turning every fifth day into a headline. But here’s where Dodgers fans should side-eye this prediction a little: it accidentally treats Yoshinobu Yamamoto like background music.

ESPN’s Ohtani prediction accidentally throws shade at Yoshinobu Yamamoto

Yamamoto was filthy in 2025. He was the Dodgers’ ace in the way you actually mean it — trusted when the season’s wobbling, and the one you hand the ball to when playoffs turn into a stress test. He put up a 2.49 ERA, 0.99 WHIP, and 201 strikeouts in 173 2/3 innings, those are “top-shelf Cy Young résumé” numbers. 

And then he collected the loudest possible proof of dominance: 2025 World Series MVP, with MLB.com detailing just how absurd his workload and performance were on the game’s biggest stage. 

So when ESPN frames 2026 as Ohtani’s “prove it as a pitcher” year, it’s hard not to hear the subtext: the Dodgers’ best pitching story is Ohtani. Except… the Dodgers already lived an all-caps pitching story in 2025, and Yamamoto authored most of it.

The Dodgers are so stacked that if they had a clean bill of health, this might be less “Ohtani vs. the NL” and more “Dodgers vs. Dodgers.” The projected rotation mix is utterly ridiculous — Ohtani, Yamamoto, Blake Snell, Tyler Glasnow, and Roki Sasaki. That’s an All-Star ballot with a travel day.

Which brings us to the real wrinkle ESPN kinda glosses over: usage. Dave Roberts has already talked about being careful with workloads — especially with the World Baseball Classic conversation hanging over the Japanese stars — and even floated the idea that Ohtani might not be on a standard every-fifth-day routine. If Ohtani’s innings are managed, you’re immediately in the land where Yamamoto’s steadier volume (and the “ace of a title defense” narrative) can matter a ton.

ESPN can predict Ohtani for Cy Young. Totally fair. But calling it “bold” without acknowledging the guy who just pitched like a franchise legend and grabbed World Series MVP on the way out? That’s the slight.

If anything, the most Dodgers outcome possible is this: Ohtani is brilliant, Yamamoto is even better, and the rest of the league is left arguing which one they’re more terrified to face.