shohei ohtani alert

brilliant, kudos

pretty good

Geez

Can confirm

Thought this guy was injured?

The 2025 rotation of healthy Ohtani, Glasgow, Yamamoto, Kershaw keeps me up at night, tossing and turning, cold sweats, mumbling prayers, visions of titanium UCLs, perfect games flash across the ceiling, post-season sweeps celebrations ringing in my ears

Then I wake up and we’re sweeping the braves

it's pretty hard to hit a ball 464 ft, even moreso to slightly opposite field.

Leading the NL in hitting and slugging, but Betts still #1 in bWAR (and OBP).

In his MVP and MVP runner-up seasons of 2021-2022, his bWAR for batting was 4.9 and 3.4 respectively, he's already at 2.4 and on pace for over 9.0, which is even more impressive considering how much of his previous WAR value was due to his pitching.

Wonder if a team's ever had two 10+ WAR guys.

Good place to start, the '27 Yankees: Ruth, 12.6; Gehrig, 11.9. Beyond that, probably not.

yeah, at least by fWAR, there have only been a handful of seasons where multiple players reached 10.0+ fWAR:

2001: Barry Bonds (12.5, SFG) and Randy Johnson (10.4, ARI)
1965: Willie Mays (10.7, SFG) and Sandy Koufax (10.0, LAD)
1961: Mickey Mantle (10.3, NYY) and Norm Cash (10.2, DET)
1948: Stan Musial (11.0, STL) and Lou Boudreau (10.9, CLE)
1927: Babe Ruth (12.9, NYY), Lou Gehrig (12.4, NYY), and Rogers Hornsby (10.4, NYG)
1924: Babe Ruth (12.3, NYY) and Rogers Hornsby (12.2, STL)
1921: Babe Ruth (13.7, NYY) and Rogers Hornsby (11.1, STL)
1908: Honus Wagner (11.8, PIT) and Christy Mathewson (10.8, NYG)

Almost three bWARs in 2018: Mookie (10.7), deGrom and Trout at 9.9.

Not enough energy to start looking up all the bWARs, but 2000 had Pedro and A-Rod both above 10.0.

Ohtani's batting average (.365) is currently higher than The Angel's win percentage (.361)

https://www.cbssports.com/mlb/news/shohei-ohtani-gambling-scandal-interpreter-ippei-mizuhara-to-plead-guilty-faces-up-to-33-years-in-prison/

Mizuhara, described by the Attorney's Office as Ohtani's "de facto manager," will plead guilty to one count of bank fraud and one count of subscribing to a false tax return at an arraignment scheduled for May 14. He faces a maximum sentence of 33 years in prison, five years of supervised release and a fine of $1,250,000.

The 39-year-old former interpreter will be required to pay full restitution to his victims, which includes $16,975,010 to Victim A, Ohtani, and $1,149,400 to the IRS.

As well as the millions siphoned out of Ohtani's account to pay off gambling debt, Mizuhara also bought $325,000 worth of baseball cards on eBay and other online resellers in order to flip them and profit himself. In September 2023, Ohtani agreed to pay for Mizuhara's $60,000 dental work and provided him with a check. Instead, according to prosecutors, Mizuhara paid the bill with Ohtani's debit card and deposited the check into his personal account.

Mizuhara also admitted to falsely reporting his taxable income on his IRS tax returns in 2022, resulting in the tax fraud charge. According to the plea deal, Mizuhara falsely claimed he was single when he was in fact married and failed to report additional income of $4,100,000 that year.

Not a good day to be an ippei-stan

In September 2023, Ohtani agreed to pay for Mizuhara's $60,000 dental work and provided him with a check.

POV scant minutes after you took the over AND the spread:

https://streamable.com/jnpw0y

#freeippei

First walk-off hit as a Dodger yesterday ... and his first walk-off in four years? I know the Angels were a bad team when he played there (if you're not winning, you're not getting walk-off hits) but that's still a surprising non-stat.

Not sure if this was noted in the New Yorker thread:

https://i.postimg.cc/2S7VvbLc/shohei.jpg

(Nothing inside that I can see.)

cmon whaaat

The worst part is, he doesn't even look anything like that

Pure disrespect for his running game

cmon whaaat

You disapprove? A Pinterest page suggests they've done around 25 baseball covers, most of a general nature. Seems like quite an honour--artists do mess around with details. All that's missing is a Roger Angell piece inside.

Well it suggests he bets on games, which seems borderline libellous

Oh, god, I totally missed that!

I guess you could be charitable and take that as "makes a lot of money"...but you're almost certainly right.

(If they ever got sued, I bet that'd be their defense, though. "Gambling? How so...")

took that as pocket ripe for picking/his focus is on the game

That's a nice interpretation. I say we go with that

hmm maybe

(I didn't see it as particularly libellous, more an illustration on how shohei's game and the fat stacks of cash surrounding that game are insepperable; ippei-gate just being one product of that)

But Bulb's phrasing for simple and pointed.

I honestly just thought it was a cute New Yorker cover on how he is well paid. Never thought of the others but now it's ambiguous.

Shohei, be careful of your money!

I thought it was a comment on his un-deferred salary (pocket-change) because he is anti-tax.

#freeippei

https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2024-05-22/dodgers-star-shohei-ohtani-buys-la-canada-flintridge-mansion-for-7-85-million

I think he's making more than 2 million a year

more pics here https://www.realtor.com/news/celebrity-real-estate/shohei-ohtani-buys-southern-california-mansion/

i feel like it's surprisingly modest?

He seems to like modern. Don't know if the $17m Big Island, Hawaii house he's building has been mentioned here yet

https://maunakealiving.com/real-estate/the-vista/

Goes up against Paul Skenes tonight.

Should be fun. Tough loss for Glasnow, though the man can wear the hell out of a sock.

On the subject of whether regular people still think Ohtani gambles, our 18yo nephew was under the impression that Ohtani had been caught gambling and hadn't heard anything about him being cleared. He openly says he hates baseball, although we were playing trivia at a brewery showing the game so he did ask "Is Paul Skenes good?" 😉

That's related (though different) to what I was saying on a different thread: that my friend, a casual fan who assumes that Ohtani's story is just a cover, might be a better barometer of general opinion than more dedicated fans, who Want to Believe.

There's a pretty high correlation in 2024 between people who enjoy sports and people who enjoy gambling. Many would rather imagine Ohtani is a cool antihero gambler instead of accept that he is a fucking moron.

Those two qualities are a package deal btw

https://www.nbclosangeles.com/local-2/shohei-ohtanis-ex-interpreter-ippei-mizuhara-banned-from-delivering-for-uber-eats/3431730/

The former interpreter for the Los Angeles Dodgers star Shohei Ohtani, Ippei Mizuhara, has lost his other job as an Uber Eats driver.

Mizuhara was banned from delivering for Uber Eats due to his pending litigation, a spokesperson told NBC4.

"Mizuhara has been an UberEats courier for a few years. Given these recent charges, he no longer has access to the platform," said Gabriela Condarco-Quesada, with Uber Eats.

what???

when it rains it pours