\n<\/p>\n
Crack!<\/i><\/p>\n
The baseball soared into the October sky, Shohei Ohtani<\/a> gliding down the first base line as he watched it travel back, back, back \u2026<\/p>\n \u2026 only to be caught a few inches in front of the left-field wall by Max Kepler.<\/p>\n So close.<\/p>\n So close to a seventh-inning home run that could have made Game 3 a game. So close to a home run that could have revitalized baseball\u2019s best player in this National League Division Series.<\/p>\n Ohtani is now one for 14 with seven strikeouts in this best-of-five series, in which the Dodgers<\/a>\u2019 lead was reduced to two games to one after an 8-2 loss<\/a> to the Philadelphia Phillies.<\/p>\n While Ohtani was hitless in five at-bats on Wednesday night, Phillies counterpart Kyle Schwarber launched two homers, including a 455-foot blast in the fourth inning that changed the complexion of the game and series.<\/p>\n The heart of the Phillies\u2019 order awakened, the Dodgers\u2019 didn\u2019t, and that was more or less the difference in the game.<\/p>\n Ohtani is the Dodgers\u2019 failsafe, and the failsafe is failing. The Dodgers remain in control of this NLDS, but considering the shortcomings of their present roster, they almost certainly can\u2019t win a World Series<\/a> with him being as ineffective at the plate as he was for extended stretches of the postseason last year.<\/p>\n