Oh-oh-oh-tani

 Surely there must be another, you can't help thinking. The game is so old, and so many have passed its way.

But if there is, the sheer avalanche of baseball's years obscures the memory. 

If there is anyone in the long history of the Pastime who had a day like Shohei Ohtani of the Los Angeles Dodgers had yesterday, please step forward and be recognized. Babe Ruth, perhaps, when he wielded both a lightning arm and a nuclear bat? Tyrus Raymond Cobb? Lou Gehrig, Joltin' Joe, Ted Williams, Willie Mays, Hank Aaron, Josh Gibson, Satchel Paige?

Name one. Give me a date. Reach deep into the swirl of years, back when John McGraw, the little jerk, was sliding in spikes-high for the dirty-bird Baltimore Orioles. Back when Cap Anson and Nap Lajoie were doing their thing, and Walter Johnson was throwing so hard he made the baseball all but vanish, and Old Hoss Radbourn was winning 59 (or 60) games in '84 -- and not 1984, either.

None of them ever did what Ohtani did yesterday.

What he did, in Game 4 of the NLCS, was hit three home runs in three at-bats, one of them a titanic 467-foot moonshot. He did that while also pitching six innings of two-hit shutout ball and striking out 10.

Three dingers launched. Zero runs allowed. Ten punch-outs. In the same game.

Greatest single performance in the history of the game, it says here.

And, yes, OK, if that declaration is classic prisoner-of-the-moment stuff, it's a hell of a moment in which to be imprisoned. And there is less peril in making said declaration than by any rights there should be in a game which has been an organized professional enterprise for 155 years.

The closest analogy to Ohtani is of course the Babe, who like Ohtani was both a pitcher and slugger. Before the Yankees bought him from the Red Sox and made him solely the latter, Ruth was one of the best pitchers in the game. Across his career, no one has ever approached his combined numbers: 94 wins, 107 complete game in 148 starts, 488 strikeouts and a 2.28 ERA as a pitcher; 2,873 hits, 714 home runs, 2,214 RBI and a .342 average as a batter.

But did he ever have a game like Ohtani had on Oct. 17, 2025?

If he did, history does not record it. Especially in the postseason. Especially when, in a 5-1 win to complete a sweep of the Brewers in the NLCS, Ohtani drove in three of the Dodgers' five runs, scored three of their five runs, and got the win on the mound -- his second of the series.

Surely there must be another, you can't help thinking. The game is so old.

But maybe there isn't. Maybe it's just as Dodgers manager Dave Roberts said last night, when it was all over.

"That's the greatest night in baseball history," he declared.

So be it.