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A four-seam fastball and two knuckle curves.
Three pitches was all it took for East Setauket’s Ben Brown to etch his name into a memorable MLB moment halfway around the world.
The Ward Melville graduate had reigning National League MVP Shohei Ohtani swinging at air, ending the fifth inning of Tuesday’s MLB season opener in Tokyo with a nasty knuckle curve that drew a check swing from the Japanese superstar.
Ohtani whiffs, side retired
Check out Brown’s big pitch below.
The 25-year-old Chicago Cubs reliever ended up taking the loss in the Cubs’ 4-1 defeat to the Los Angeles Dodgers in the first game of the MLB Japan Series, allowing two earned runs over 2⅔ innings of work. He walked three and surrendered four hits while collecting five strikeouts overall.
Earlier in the game, Ohtani got the better of Brown with a single in the fifth inning, eventually coming around to score on a Teoscar Hernández groundout.
Brown’s second MLB season
The 6-foot-6 right-hander’s path to his international showdown with Ohtani, arguably the world’s best player, began when the Philadelphia Phillies selected him in the 33rd round of the 2017 MLB Draft.
Brown was dealt to Chicago in a 2022 in a trade that sent veteran reliever David Robertson to Philadelphia.
Brown debuted with the Cubs in 2023, starting eight games and appearing in 15 total. He posted a 1-3 record with a solid 3.58 ERA in his rookie campaign.
Top photo: Chicago Cubs’ Ben Brown throws to the Los Angeles Dodgers in the fifth inning of an MLB Japan Series baseball game in Tokyo, Japan, Tuesday, March 18, 2025. (AP Photo/Eugene Hoshiko)
