The Ohtani Rule, Explained: How MLB Rewrote the Rulebook for One Player

Shohei Ohtani is the only player in baseball history with his own rule — and in 2026, rival managers started saying so out loud. Here’s what the Ohtani rule actually does, why it hands the Dodgers a roster edge no other club can match, and why nobody else in the sport qualifies to use it.

Key Takeaways

• The Ohtani rule lets a player who starts as both the pitcher and the designated hitter stay in the game as the DH after he’s pulled from the mound.
• It took effect in 2022, the same year the National League adopted the universal DH, so all 30 clubs got it at once.
• A separate rule — the two-way player designation, in place since 2020 — is the one that matters most competitively: Ohtani doesn’t count toward the 13-pitcher roster limit, so the Dodgers effectively carry an extra arm.
• Cubs manager Craig Counsell called the setup “probably the most bizarre rule” in April 2026. Dodgers manager Dave Roberts didn’t dispute that it helps Los Angeles.
• As of 2026, Ohtani is still the only player in MLB who meets the two-way criteria. He didn’t pitch at all in the 2026 World Baseball Classic.

What the Ohtani Rule Actually Does

The Ohtani rule applies when one player is listed as both the starting pitcher and the designated hitter. When that player is lifted from the mound, he stays in the lineup as the DH instead of leaving the game.

That sounds small. It isn’t. Under the standard rule, a starting pitcher is done the moment he’s replaced. If he was also the DH, his team loses the DH spot along with him — so the only way to keep his bat was to send him out to a fielding position.

Picture Ohtani hitting leadoff and starting on the mound. He throws five innings and comes out. Without the rule, his day is over. With it, he stays in as the leadoff DH and keeps taking at-bats in the sixth and beyond.

Two conditions have to be met: the same player must be listed as both the starting pitcher and the DH, and he must actually take the mound as the starter before being relieved. The rule covers starters only. A reliever who enters mid-game as a pitcher-DH doesn’t get the same treatment.

Before 2022: Pitch, Then Go Play the Outfield

From Ohtani’s MLB debut in 2018, the Angels wrestled with this constantly. On his start days he could bat leadoff and pitch — but keeping his bat in the lineup afterward meant putting him in the outfield or the infield.

Asking a starter who just threw 100 pitches to go stand in right field is bad baseball and worse injury management. So the Angels usually took the bat out with the arm. The rule change removed the tradeoff: once Ohtani’s pitching day ends, he rests his legs and keeps hitting.

The Roster Loophole That Really Bothers Rival Teams

The DH rule gets the headlines. The two-way player designation is the one that moves games.

Since 2022, MLB clubs have been capped at 13 pitchers on a 26-man active roster, expanding to 14 when rosters grow on Sept. 1. Every front office in the league lives inside that math, trading bullpen depth against bench depth all season.

Ohtani, officially designated a two-way player, doesn’t count against the 13. The Dodgers can run out 13 pitchers plus Ohtani — an extra bullpen arm every other team has to find room for. In a September stretch run or a week of one-run games, that’s real.

The designation, which predates the DH rule by two years, requires a player to throw at least 20 innings in the majors in the current or prior season, and to start at least 20 games as a DH or position player with a minimum of three plate appearances in each.

One active player has ever cleared both bars: Ohtani.

How a 2021 All-Star Workaround Became a Rule

The origin is the 2021 All-Star Game. Ohtani was voted in twice that summer — by the fans as the American League’s starting DH, and by the players as a pitcher. Nothing in the format accounted for a man being both.

MLB improvised, letting him start on the mound and remain in the lineup after he was pulled. It worked in front of a packed stadium and a national television audience, fans and media liked it, and the league made it permanent for 2022.

The Universal DH Made It a 30-Team Rule

The timing mattered. 2022 was also the year the National League finally adopted the DH. Before that, NL pitchers hit, and a DH-based rule would have been an AL-only curiosity. With every club now using a DH, the Ohtani rule landed across all 30 teams at once.

The World Baseball Classic adopted it in 2023, which is when a rule named for one player became a genuine fixture of the sport, internationally as well as in MLB.

There’s also a business layer nobody in the league pretends isn’t there. Maximizing Ohtani’s plate appearances means maximizing the reason a large share of the audience tuned in. Competitive logic and revenue logic happened to point the same direction.

Craig Counsell Says One Team Plays by Different Rules

In April 2026, the argument went public. Cubs manager Craig Counsell, dealing with pitching injuries of his own, was asked about roster flexibility and took aim at the two-way designation.

“It’s a rule to help offense, I think, more than anything, if you ask me,” Counsell said. “And then there’s one team that’s allowed to carry basically one of both, and he gets special consideration. Which is probably the most bizarre rule … for one team.”

He added: “There’s not another player like that, but one team gets different rules for that player.”

Roberts didn’t deny the advantage. “The thing is, it certainly benefits us, because we have the player,” the Dodgers manager said. “But that’s something that, any team that had Ohtani would have that player.” He went further: “We’re more than willing for other teams to go out and find a player who can do both. He’s an exception because he’s an exceptional player. It is what it is.”

Writing for OutKick on April 21, 2026, Ian Miller landed in the same place: “Any team could take advantage of this rule, were there other players who were capable of pitching and hitting.”

The rule isn’t closed to 29 teams. The talent pool is.

Ohtani Never Used the Rule at the 2026 WBC

The Ohtani rule was available at the 2026 World Baseball Classic, where the DH is used in every game. It went unused.

Roberts had signaled the Dodgers’ preference well in advance, saying in December 2025 that “Shohei is very in tune with his body” and that “the thought is he’s probably just going to hit.” Los Angeles wanted a full season out of him and was wary of the injury risk in March. Ohtani himself was eager to play.

He played every game as Japan’s leadoff DH and never pitched. He hit .462 with three home runs and seven RBIs in 13 at-bats, including a game-tying leadoff homer in the bottom of the first in the March 14 quarterfinal against Venezuela. Japan lost 8-5, and Samurai Japan’s title defense ended in the final eight. Manager Hirokazu Ibata later reflected that bringing Ohtani in from the bullpen was an option the staff had left on the table.

Why There’s Still No Second Ohtani

Counsell is right that the rule is open to everyone. He’s also right, in practice, that it belongs to one club — because the qualifying standard is a career almost nobody in baseball history could meet.

Before he ever reached MLB, Ohtani was doing this in Japan with the Hokkaido Nippon-Ham Fighters (Pacific League, based in Sapporo), winning a league MVP in a season where he posted 10 wins with an ERA under 2.00 while batting over .300. That’s the baseline: not “can pitch a little,” but front-line starter and middle-of-the-order bat in the same summer.

Throwing roughly 100 pitches every sixth day while taking close to 600 plate appearances a year demands a physical, mental and technical profile that simply hasn’t existed before. Ohtani’s example is filtering down — more organizations and academies now develop two-way prospects instead of forcing an early choice — but doing it at the major league level remains unprecedented.

Whether the Ohtani rule ever stops being a rule for one man is a decent proxy for where the sport is headed. The day a second player forces MLB to apply it is the day the exception becomes the standard — and baseball turns a page.