Dodgers’ Roki Sasaki announces marriage; Bobby Miller feeling better after comebacker
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PHOENIX — The announcement came out of nowhere, so much so that Dodgers manager Dave Roberts didn’t even know about it before his daily address with reporters on Friday morning.
“Roki?” Roberts asked with surprise when informed that Roki Sasaki, the club’s new 23-year-old phenom pitcher from Japan, had announced earlier in the morning he got married this offseason. “What? I didn’t know he had a girlfriend.”
Just as Shohei Ohtani’s marriage announcement last spring came as a surprise around Dodgers camp, Sasaki’s previously unknown nuptials were the news of the morning at Camelback Ranch after Sasaki made the announcement in an Instagram post shortly before the team’s daily workout.
Until Friday, not even Ohtani and Yoshinobu Yamamoto — who have previously played with Sasaki on Japan’s World Baseball Classic team — were aware he’d tied the knot.
There are no immediate plans to introduce the system in regular-season games yet. Questions remain about how large a role it should have in games that count.
“They were surprised,” Sasaki said in Japanese. “At first, they didn’t believe me.”
Sasaki’s marriage came amid an offseason of total change for the hard-throwing right-hander, who signed with the Dodgers last month after an extended free agency and posting process that had much of the league pursuing the highly coveted pitcher.
“It’s my first season in the majors and we both have uncertainty, but I think it would be good if we could work together and support each other,” Sasaki said. “I can’t do anything on my own, so ... in that sense, I think it’s important. I think it’s something really special.”
Sasaki didn’t reveal many details about his bride, other than calling her a “normal” and “nice” person. Since his announcement came just as many of his new teammates were taking the field, he figured most of them weren’t even aware of the news yet.
At the very least, however, Roberts offered Sasaki his congratulations before the team headed out for a Friday afternoon game against the Chicago Cubs at Sloan Field.
As for a gift for the newlyweds from Sasaki’s new manager?
“The wedding gift will be on the way,” Roberts joked, “after I meet his wife.”
Bobby Miller feeling better after comebacker
Amazingly, less than 24 hours after taking a 106-mph line-drive comebacker off his head in the Dodgers’ Cactus League opener Thursday, pitcher Bobby Miller told Roberts on Friday morning he “feels much better today than he did yesterday.”
“He has a little bit of a headache, but there’s no fracture,” Roberts added, after chatting with Miller at the team’s facility Friday morning. “Today, he’s just gonna lay low, but he feels very confident that he can kind of pick up his throwing program soon. But he’s just got to keep going through the concussion protocol just to make sure that we stay on the right track.”
Yoshinobu Yamamoto throws 27 pitches and Bobby Miller takes a comebacker off his head and is placed into concussion protocol during the Dodgers’ 12-4 loss to the Chicago Cubs.
Miller remains in concussion protocol, and his timeline to be ready for the start of the regular season remains unclear.
But, Roberts said the 25-year-old was in “good spirits” while getting treatment Friday morning, and that there wasn’t even notable bruising on the spot of his forehead where the ball hit.
“He said, in his words, ‘I’ve got a hard head,’” Roberts relayed with a laugh. “He certainly escaped in a lot of ways.”
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