Los Angeles Dodgers manager Dave Roberts told reporters after Wednesday night’s 14-1 win over the Cincinnati Reds that two-way star Shohei Ohtani is headed to the 15-day injured list with right arm/biceps discomfort and a lingering left knee issue — and that the club is calling up top prospect Josue De Paula from Double-A Tulsa to fill the designated-hitter void.

Because Ohtani is a two-way player, he must go on the 15-day injured list used for pitchers rather than the 10-day IL available to position players, MLB Trade Rumors, TSN, and CBS Los Angeles reported. MLB Trade Rumors noted the transaction was not yet official as of Thursday morning — Los Angeles is off today and is expected to make it official ahead of Friday’s game in Miami.

Ohtani has sat out six of the Dodgers’ last seven games. He returned Monday against Cincinnati, went 0-for-3, then returned to the bench Tuesday and Wednesday after telling the club he felt something in his right arm during a Monday swing. Roberts said the biceps issue is the primary near-term concern; the left knee has already kept him off the mound since early July, and plans for a pitching return this season have been scrapped.

“I think that if it were a postseason game tomorrow, he would be in the lineup,” Roberts said, as relayed by Fabian Ardaya of The Athletic via MLB Trade Rumors. “I think that now you’re talking about two weeks, 14 days. I feel that that’s substantial. He’ll be in a much better place than he was today.”

With the IL stint backdated to Monday’s appearance, Ohtani is eligible to return around Sept. 23 for Los Angeles’ series against the San Diego Padres — leaving him a maximum of about five regular-season games before the postseason, per TSN and USA Today’s Bob Nightengale. He will not travel on the club’s East Coast trip through Miami and Cincinnati; Roberts said he will stay in Los Angeles to calm the arm, then resume hitting after a short rest.

“In talking to Shohei, the doctors, the training staff, it’s the right thing to do. We tried to kick the can as much as we could,” Roberts said, according to Sportsnet and CBS Los Angeles.

CBS Sports, citing MLB.com, also quoted Roberts on the huddle that sealed the move: there was “not much certainty that he’d be in a much better place” for Friday and Saturday, so “taking it off the table seemed like the best course of action.”

De Paula skips Triple-A for DH debut

Josue De Paula, the Dodgers’ consensus top prospect, is expected to join the club Friday in Miami and make his major-league debut as the designated hitter. Roberts said the 21-year-old will get the “lion’s share” of DH at-bats while Ohtani is out, Katie Woo of The Athletic reported via MLB Trade Rumors. Sportsnet reported De Paula is coming directly from Double-A Tulsa — a rare skip of Triple-A for a Dodgers position player.

Through Double-A this season, De Paula has been one of baseball’s hottest bats: TSN and CBS Sports put him at .303/.401/.547 with 27 home runs and 31 stolen bases in 124 games for Tulsa (MLB Trade Rumors separately cited a .302 mark with 26 homers and 31 steals across a slightly different game count). Evaluators and Roberts have framed the call-up as a chance for a bat already viewed as major-league ready to cut its teeth while Los Angeles protects Ohtani for October.

“Is it going to be 100 percent? Probably not,” Roberts said of Ohtani’s return window, per MLB Trade Rumors and Nightengale. “But I do think that with this time that we’re taking now, he’ll be in an adequate spot to finish the season.”

Sources