Emmet Sheehan started Tuesday for the Dodgers in the middle game of their series against the San Diego Padres at Petco Park, a rotation shift that let Shohei Ohtani line up for Wednesday’s finale directly in front of an off day. It was the first start this season for Los Angeles on four days rest.
Sheehan, who had been sharp last Thursday with two runs allowed in six innings and six strikeouts against San Francisco, moved back a day so the Dodgers could keep their preferred rest pattern intact. Tuesday was technically his third career start on four days rest, and the 49th game of the 2026 season gave Los Angeles a rare chance to use him that way without disrupting the rest of the staff.
The numbers show how unusual that still is for this club. The Dodgers had nine starts on four days rest in 2024 after excluding openers, relievers making spot starts and some late-season maneuvering. By comparison, they had 70 starts on five days rest and 71 starts with six days or more last year under the same exclusions. Through Monday, 2026 had already brought 15 Dodgers starts on five days rest and 32 starts with longer rest, while Tuesday marked the 30th Dodgers start on four or three days rest since the start of 2024.
For the Dodgers, that made Sheehan’s turn feel less like a one-off than another piece of a broader pitching plan that has steadily pushed the team toward extra rest for select arms. In 2024, the club’s first start on four days rest did not come until the 15th game, when Bobby Miller allowed two runs in four innings on the road in Minnesota on April 10. Last year, the first such start came on May 11, when Tony Gonsolin threw five scoreless innings in the 41st game of the season.
Sheehan has been part of that mix before. On September 21, 2023, he struck out nine in 4 2/3 innings with one run allowed on four days rest. On September 26, 2025, he made a one-inning start to keep himself available for relief work as early as four days later in the wild card round. Tuesday was another reminder that the Dodgers are willing to move starters around when the schedule gives them room.
The larger trend is unmistakable. Pitching on four days rest was the norm for decades in baseball, but it has faded over time, and the Dodgers have leaned hard into the opposite approach. Yoshinobu Yamamoto has worked with at least five days rest in every one of his major league appearances except one World Series outing last November, and Roki Sasaki is on the same extra-rest plan as Yamamoto and Ohtani. Ohtani’s status as a two-way player also gives the club a roster advantage, since he does not count against the 13-pitcher limit and makes a six-man rotation easier to carry.
That leaves the Dodgers with a familiar tradeoff: protect arms now, or ask more of them later. On Tuesday, they chose the first option, and Sheehan was the one who absorbed it.
