Shohei Ohtani leads the Dodgers' fourth NLCS game against the Mets with home runs

NEW YORK (AP) — Shohei Ohtani hit a home run off Jose Quintana on Thursday night to lead off Game 4 of the National League Championship Series and lift the Los Angeles Dodgers past the New York Mets.

Ohtani took Quintana's first pitch for a ball and then drove a sinker over the middle of the plate 422 feet into the Mets' bullpen in right-center field for his third home run of the season.

That gave Ohtani home runs on consecutive at-bats after his three-run shot off Tylor Megill in the eighth inning of the Dodgers' 8-0 win on Wednesday night helped give Los Angeles a 2-1 lead.

The likely NL MVP began the evening in the postseason 0-for-22 when batting without anyone on base, and 7-for-9 with two homers and eight RBIs when batting with runners on board.

It was the seventh leadoff home run in Dodgers postseason history. The 117.8 mph drive was the third-most hit postseason home run since Statcast began tracking in 2015, behind Philadelphia's Kyle Schwarber in last year's NLCS (119.7 mph) and New York's Giancarlo Stanton Yankees in a 2020 AL Division Series (118.3 mph). ).

Quintana had not allowed a home run in his last eight starts since August 20.

Mets star Francisco Lindor, who hit a leadoff home run in Game 2 at Dodger Stadium, was unable to keep up with Ohtani in the bottom of the first as he grounded out.

But New York's next batter, Mark Vientos, singled Yoshinobu Yamamoto for his fourth home run of the playoffs, which tied the score at 1-1.

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