The Los Angeles Dodgers' pitching plans just got a lot more complicated. After Blake Snell was placed on the 15-day injured list—retroactive to his lone start of the season—manager Dave Roberts has been forced to recalibrate the rotation. Snell, who was expected to be a key piece for the team, won't be eligible for activation until late May at the earliest.
The trouble began with shoulder discomfort early in the year. Snell hoped to manage it and avoid a setback once he got going. But then came the elbow issue—loose bodies, an injury that's been surprisingly common this season (teammate Edwin Diaz recently needed surgery for the same thing). Snell had been scheduled for a minor league rehab start with Ontario before rejoining the big league club, and the Dodgers had slotted him into a weekend matchup against the Atlanta Braves after Tyler Glasnow went down. It was a rough outing, but having the former Cy Young winner back on the mound felt like a major milestone for the team's season priorities. Instead, they're now without both Snell and Glasnow, and a roster that once seemed loaded with starting pitching depth is suddenly feeling the pinch.
On the surface, the obvious fix would be to scrap the extra rest days and just roll out a standard five-man rotation. But Roberts isn't buying that logic. He's concerned that pushing starters harder could compromise their health—and with the Dodgers' injury luck so far, that's the last thing they need.
"Right now, I don't know if we have six candidates (for the rotation)," Roberts said. "I think we're prepared to do whatever we can. But I will say the most important thing is to keep the guys on their schedules, not try to push too much because of circumstances with the rotation, because then you start to compromise their health. So whether we backfill somehow or do bullpen days, we're prepared to do whatever it takes."
As things stand, the rotation features Shohei Ohtani, Yoshinobu Yamamoto, Justin Wrobleski, Roki Sasaki, and Emmet Sheehan. But with Ohtani's two-way role requiring extra rest, the Dodgers may need to lean on bullpen days more than they'd like. For a team with championship aspirations, navigating this stretch without their full arsenal will be a true test of depth—and creativity.