Ten short months after joining the Los Angeles Dodgers with the goal of finally challenging for a championship, Shohei Ohtani is on the threshold of realising his dream.
The 30-year-old Japanese superstar heads into the first World Series of his career on Friday aiming to crown a record-breaking season by capturing baseball’s biggest prize.
“I finally arrived at this stage,” Ohtani said on Sunday after the Dodgers clinched their World Series berth with a series defeat of the New York Mets. “The goal was to get this far.”
The journey will not be complete, however, unless Ohtani and the Dodgers take care of business against the vaunted New York Yankees line-up awaiting them in game one at Dodger Stadium on Friday.
In a sense, Ohtani’s first season in Dodger blue has been a case of making up for lost time following six frustrating seasons down the freeway with the Los Angeles Angels.
Ohtani arrived in Major League Baseball in 2018 widely hyped as the most talented all-round baseball player since Babe Ruth, offering a rare combination of elite pitching and hitting.
For the most part Ohtani lived up to that lofty billing, winning rookie of the year honors in his debut MLB season, American League Most Valuable Player honors in 2021 and 2023 as well as two Silver Slugger awards.
Yet individual success came against a backdrop of collective failure with the under-achieving Angels failing to reach the postseason once during Ohtani’s six seasons in Anaheim.
So when the Dodgers came calling after Ohtani entered free agency last year, dangling a 10-year $700 million contract, the decision was a no-brainer.
The Dodgers wanted an elite talent to help get them over the line after years of postseason failures; Ohtani wanted to be challenging for a World Series.
‘One of the boys’
“For us it’s all about winning,” Dodgers president of baseball operations Andrew Friedman said. “It jived perfectly with everything (Ohtani) was saying.”
Ohtani signalled his commitment to the cause by agreeing to defer $680 million of his contract until the end of his deal, freeing up money for the Dodgers to build a winning team around him.
Ohtani’s dream move was nearly blown off course as the season got underway, however, after it emerged that his long-time translator, Ippei Mizuhara, had stolen millions of dollars from him to pay off gambling debts.
The baseball world held its breath wondering if Ohtani would be sucked into a possibly career-ending scandal.
Federal prosecutors cleared Ohtani of wrongdoing, stating that the player had no knowledge of Mizuhara’s crimes and had in fact been a victim.
Ohtani brushed off the scandal over the course of his first campaign with the Dodgers, dazzling fans by becoming the first player in history to amass 50 home runs and 50 stolen bases in a single season.
After spending the first six years of his MLB career as a frustrated spectator in the postseason, Ohtani has reveled in the pressure-laden theater of the playoffs.
In 42 at bats he has amassed 12 hits and blasted three home runs, the pick of them a monstrous 422-foot effort into the top deck in a 10-2 game four win over the Mets.
Along the way he has become a beloved part of the Dodgers clubhouse, delighting team-mates with a sunny disposition off the field that belies a killer instinct on it.
“He can be goofy and playful and look like he’s really having fun playing the game but then also at the same time be super focused and locked in,” said Dodgers veteran Chris Taylor. “It’s a special talent.”
Dodgers manager Dave Roberts described Ohtani as “one of one”.
“He’s still a very private guy, but I think he just really wants to be looked at as just one of the guys,” Roberts said.
Enrique Hernandez, a talismanic figure in the Dodgers locker room, said simply: “He’s one of us. He’s one of the boys. And I’m glad to have him in the group.”