Los Angeles Dodgers manager Dave Roberts formally announced on Sunday that Clayton Kershaw will start the club’s Cactus League opener and on Opening Day against the San Diego Padres at Petco Park.
The news was hardly a surprise, though Roberts previously played coy when asked just over one week ago if he was ready to name the staff’s unquestioned ace as the Opening Day starter.
Kershaw faced live batters for the first time this spring on Saturday, which Scott Kazmir did on Sunday, leaving Kenta Maeda, Brett Anderson and Alex Wood to follow in the coming days.
The throwing schedule lends to how the rotation may be pieced together once the 2016 regular season begins. The ballyhooed depth will be needed early as Hyun-Jin Ryu isn’t expected to return from last year’s shoulder surgery until May.
Maeda factors heavily into the Dodgers’ ability to overcome the loss of Zack Greinke to the Arizona Diamondbacks in free agency. The Japanese right-hander is slated to make his Dodgers debut on March 5 in a home tilt against the D-Backs, according to Bill Plunkett of the OC Register:
Roberts said "don't read too much into it" but Scott Kazmir is throwing live BP today, day after Kershaw. Did say Kenta Maeda will start Sat
— Bill Plunkett (@billplunkettocr) February 28, 2016
Like others who have made the jump from pitching in Japan to the Majors, Maeda faces the hurdle of adjusting to pitching more frequently. He’s spending Spring Training experimenting with different routines and sought advice from Yu Darvish and Hisashi Iwakuma.
Dodgers Complete 2016 Spring Training Schedule.
As for being part of the equation to replace Greinke, Kershaw said recently he doesn’t believe Maeda knows who the former Dodgers pitcher is, and thus doubts he is feeling any pressure to help offset the production lost.
Maeda, who will turns 28 years old on April 11, signed an eight-year, $25 million contract with the Dodgers in January. He can earn just shy of $100 million over the lifetime of the contract by reaching incentives for games started and innings pitched.
Maeda was 97-67 with a 2.39 ERA, 1.05 WHIP and averaged 7.4 strikeouts per nine innings in eight seasons with the Hiroshima Carp. Last season, he went 15-8 with a 2.09 ERA in 29 starts (206.1 innings pitched). Maeda posted a sub-3.00 ERA in each of the last six seasons, including a career-best 1.53 ERA in 2012.
