bomb from Shohei Ohtani, to beat the Detroit Tigers 5-4 in their home opener at Dodger Stadium.

“I thought the ceremony was fantastic,” Dodgers manager Dave Roberts said. “I thought having a beautiful day, acknowledging what we accomplished in 2024. I thought the fans were really into it. The presentation with Freddie meeting Gibby, I thought Gibby throwing out the first pitch was fantastic. Every day is special in its own right, but having these gold hats and uniforms (as defending champions) — we nailed it.”

During the festive pre-game, Ice Cube rolled through the center field gate, driving a Dodger blue convertible with the World Series trophy on the front seat next to him.

There was more traffic when Blake Snell took the mound for his Dodgers debut.

“Good to get the first one out of the way,” Snell said, describing himself as feeling “excited, just a lot of emotions.

“I think my only 1-2-3 inning was the first inning. After that, it was a lot of fighting to get outs. But I’m excited about where I’m at. A lot to learn so I’m excited about that.”

Snell pitched out of trouble in the second and third innings, stranding runners at second and third in the second inning then at third again in the third inning.

In the fourth, he made more trouble for himself by walking the leadoff man, then giving up a single to Manuel Margot and walking Jake Rogers to load the bases with two outs. On the way to striking out Ryan Kreidler, though, he spiked a curveball into the dirt in front of home plate and it bounced through Will Smith. That allowed the run to score from third, tying the game at 1-1.

Two singles and another walk loaded the bases with one out in the fifth inning and the Tigers took a brief lead on a sacrifice fly by Margot.

It was a familiar performance from Snell. He allowed very little hard contact and got 14 swings-and-misses. He also created trouble for himself with four walks then minimized the damage by holding the Tigers to 0 for 9 with runners in scoring position. All that work pushed his pitch count to 92 and he was done after five innings.

“I thought he made pitches when he needed to make pitches and that’s kind of who he is, bearing down with guys in scoring position,” Roberts said. “I thought there were some soft-contact hits. Certainly there were some walks in there. But he got through five, got the win and certainly the pitch count’s up. I think the tale for me, the takeaway is he made pitches and beared down and minimized damage and that’s what he does.”

Snell can thank Teoscar Hernandez for getting him the win in his debut.

Tommy Edman hit the first home run of the season in Tokyo and matched it with the first Dodgers home run back in the United States, a solo shot in the second inning.

But the Dodgers were trailing 2-1 in the fifth when a single and a walk of Mookie Betts brought Hernandez up with two on and two outs.

Roberts moved Hernandez to third in the lineup against Skubal, dropping Freddie Freeman to fourth against the left-hander just as he had at times late last season and in the playoffs against left-handers. The idea was to force the opposing manager to make a decision — leave a left-handed starter in to face Hernandez if they wanted to also get the left-on-left matchup against Freeman.

Tigers manager A.J. Hinch wasn’t ready to pull Skubal in the fifth inning and his ace left a fat first-pitch fastball over the heart of the plate. Hernandez hammered it over the wall in left-center field for a three-run home run.

“He was making good pitches,” Hernandez said of Skubal, in Spanish. “Mookie had a good at-bat in front of me. He threw me a pitch out over the plate, and I took advantage as best I could.”

Hernandez’s blow put the Dodgers ahead to stay. But the Tigers chipped away against the Dodgers’ bullpen and it was Ohtani’s second home run of the season, an opposite-field drive in the seventh inning, that stood as the decisive run.