Dodgers bring World Series pedigree — and Ohtani — to face A’s in Sacramento
Major League Baseball’s biggest spectacle is coming to West Sacramento.
The Los Angeles Dodgers, the most magnetic draw in the big leagues, are coming to play the Athletics for a three-game series at Sutter Health Park beginning Monday. And there’s a chance megastar Shohei Ohtani could make a start on the mound for the back-to-back defending World Series Champions in the minor league stadium.
The Dodgers as of Saturday afternoon had not announced their starting pitchers for the A’s series, but if Ohtani continues his pattern of pitching on six days’ rest, he would be slated to start on Tuesday night.
It would become one of the biggest games of the A’s temporary three-year stay in California’s capital region after beginning play here in 2025, after their departure from Oakland and before their planned 2028 move to Las Vegas.
Here’s what to know about the three-game series at Sutter Health Park, where all three games are set to start at 6:40 p.m.
Ohtani effect
Widely considered the sport’s biggest star, Ohtani has won four MVPs in the last five years, including two straight in the National League with the Dodgers following his American League MVP nod during his final season with the Los Angeles Angels in 2023.
The 31-year-old is continuing to make his case as one of the best players in baseball history, achieving unprecedented feats as a rare two-way player who has been dominant both as a hitter and a pitcher.
On top of leading the Majors in OPS over the last three seasons, while averaging 51 home runs per year, he’s also been one of the best pitchers in baseball when healthy. This year he has a 1.58 ERA in 13 appearances, allowing just 48 hits in 79 2/3 innings with 86 strikeouts.
Ohtani, who played five seasons in Japan’s Nippon Professional Baseball before coming to the U.S. to play in MLB, continues to bring international attention to the already-popular Dodgers, with Japanese sports media sure to follow him to Sacramento.
Where Dodgers, A’s each stand
Not surprisingly, the Dodgers (52-30 entering Saturday) came into the weekend with baseball’s best record and are the heavy favorites to three-peat as champs. They lead baseball in team on-base plus slugging percentage and are second in the National League in ERA+. They are also expected to be aggressive at the Aug. 3 trade deadline to add to their starting pitching staff and bullpen.
The A’s came into Saturday with a 40-42 record, a game-and-a-half out of first place in the American League West division.
The Dodgers’ payroll plus luxury taxes due this season total $421.5 million, three times that of the A’s at $140.5 million.
Barring an unlikely matchup in the World Series, it should be the Dodgers’ only trip to West Sacramento before the A’s planned move to their new Las Vegas Ballpark in 2028. The A’s and Dodgers, non-rival interleague opponents, meet just once a year while the home team alternates, so the A’s are expected to play the Dodgers in Los Angeles in 2027.
The Dodgers have become a lightning rod in the big picture of baseball finances. The Dodgers paid $515 million in payroll and luxury tax payments while winning their second straight World Series in 2025, seven times that of the Miami Marlins, baseball’s lowest spending team.
That disparity has been a sticking point for looming CBA negotiations with the current agreement expiring in the coming offseason. Owners and some fans argue baseball needs to adopt a salary cap like all the other major professional leagues in America have to create parity. Players have said a salary cap is a non-starter, which could lead to a work stoppage in 2027.
Suffice to say, this week could be the Dodgers’ only ever appearance in West Sacramento, unless the area is awarded MLB expansion over the next decade, which could make the minor-league stadium with a capacity of fewer than 14,000 seats the epicenter of a major-league spectacle that might never be repeated.
Ticket prices for Dodgers-A’s
Tickets for all three games of the Dodgers-A’s series remained available via the A’s team website as of early Saturday afternoon — but at a premium.
Lawn seat tickets for Sutter Health Park’s “Home Run Hill” beyond the right field wall were starting at between $105 and $110 apiece for each of the three games. The least expensive available seats in the stands were going for close to $180 on the team website.
Tickets on resale websites such as SeatGeek and StubHub showed similar prices for the cheapest available seats, with the exact cost varying widely by seat location. A handful of tickets for the first row behind home plate for Tuesday’s game ranged from $1,000 to $2,000 apiece on SeatGeek as of Saturday.
