Shohei Ohtani gets big respect points for playing, but he clearly isn’t 100 percent healed after suffering a left shoulder subluxation only four days ago.
“Running is the most pain,” one Dodgers person said. “He should just hit it in the seats!”
Other Dodgers people estimate he’s 80-90 percent of himself, which is still better than 99.99 percent of mortals.
One old-time scout on a rival team isn’t giving him any excuse. “He’s just struggling right now.”
The Yankees badly wanted Tommy Edman but felt “boxed out” as the Cardinals, White Sox and Dodgers worked a three-way for weeks. Big loss.
The White Sox, losers of 121 games, scored a coup when they hired the thought to be untouchable Rangers bench Will Venable to be their new manager.
Venable turned down the Mets (and others) for an interview the year before. Folks figured he was the heir apparent to Rangers manager Bruce Bochy because he was a coveted coach and close to Rangers honcho Chris Young from their days together on the Princeton baseball and basketball teams. He also interviewed on the South Side (but never New York) when they hired Pedro Grifol (maybe he prefers deep dish).
Mets folks were shocked Venable took a job with a team in a deep rebuild after rebuffing an interview a year ago. But it’s OK, Carlos Mendoza turned out to be terrific.
Ex-Marlins manager Skip Schumaker dropped out awhile back. Like everyone who interviewed, he was impressed by White Sox GM Chris Getz. But let’s be real, he just extricated himself from the Marlins.
Follow The Post’s coverage of the Yankees in the postseason:
- Yankees’ season ends in heartbreak as they choke away Game 5 of World Series
- Aaron Judge’s crucial mistake erased breakout World Series moment
- Yankees’ Austin Wells hit with catcher’s interference call in brutal World Series moment
- Juan Soto’s season ends with million-dollar questions with Yankees future now murky
Craig Albernaz is seen as Miami’s favorite.
The early smart money has the Mets re-signing Jose Iglesias, aka Candelita, this time to a major league deal. Iglesias was a delight in the Mets clubhouse, as well as on the field, where he hit .337 (he’s the batting champion with enough plate appearances).
Speaking of batting champions, Luis Arraez was on the field with his left hand in a bandage. He had surgery to repair ligament damage he suffered in summer. No matter, he kept playing and won his third straight batting title.
A sweep would have been quite the shame in this World Series featuring the teams with the best records in each league (the fifth time this has happened in the wild-card era in 30 years, via Jayson Stark), the two MVPs (Aaron Judge and Ohtani) and the two home run leaders (also Judge and Ohtani).