Dodgers Top Prospect Gets Ultimate Praise From Dave Roberts After Debut

The Dodgers called Rushing up Wednesday, making the difficult decision to designate longtime veteran Austin Barnes for assignment in a coordinating move.

Rushing led off the bottom of the second inning with a walk and scored three batters later after Shohei Ohtani's sacrifice fly, the first of six RBIs for the reigning MVP in a 19-2 win over the Athletics on his bobblehead night.

The catcher got his first MLB hit in the third, and also came around to score. His second hit came in the eighth inning. The 19 runs marked the Dodgers' highest single-game total this season.

“It’s been something that obviously I wanted to do at a very young age,” Rushing said. “Never in a million years did I imagine it would come with a team like this. So that just makes it that much more special … And getting here and being able to scratch a couple across like that, get them out of the way, now it takes a little pressure off your shoulders.”

The Dodgers drafted Rushing with the 40th overall pick in the second round of the 2022 MLB Draft, and he ripped up the minor leagues, ascending to Triple-A in 2024, just his second full season.

Rushing is the top prospect in the Dodgers organization, and ranked the No. 15 prospect in MLB. He had a monstrous OPS of .938 in Triple-A this season, and bashed five homers while leading his team in on base percentage at .424.

"He's a hitter. … He's a strong kid," Roberts said. "He just takes good at-bats, and he controls the strike zone. And there's some slug in there, too."