LOS ANGELES — It took a stroke of authority Friday night for Shohei Ohtani to once again make history and compete with an idol.
No player of Japanese descent in Major League Baseball history has ever hit more home runs than baseball’s richest man after Ohtani hit an outside fastball from San Diego Padres starter Michael King and drove her into the left-center field pavilions at Dodger Stadium.
Career home run No. 175 tied Ohtani with Hideki Matsui, the fearsome Japanese slugger for the Yankees, Angels, Athletics and Rays whom Ohtani has long described as an idol.
For the Dodgers superstar, it was the continuation of a torrid time at the plate that occurred not only in the midst of a major chase that was well covered by the Japanese media, but also in the midst of a scandal involving his now former interpreter. Ippei Mizuhara. Mizuhara turned himself in to federal authorities Friday after being charged with bank fraud and is accused of stealing $16 million from Ohtani to pay off large gambling debts.
Yet Ohtani seems unfazed.
“He’s very stoic,” Dodgers manager Dave Roberts said Friday as his new designated hitter got off to a 22-for-64 (.343) start with four homers. “You just don’t know his emotions.” He comes every day the same. You never know if things are going well or if things are going bad, things that worry him. He’s just a pro. He just wants to play baseball.
In his first game since Mizuhara’s capitulation, Ohtani took a first-pitch sinker from King before unleashing his monumental swing, propelling the ball 107.3 mph off his bat and well into the stands for contact with the story.
The 29-year-old is one of three players of Japanese descent (along with Matsui and Ichiro Suzuki) to eclipse 100 home runs as a major league player. But matching Matsui — a two-time All-Star who has expressed mutual admiration for Ohtani, now a two-time MVP — brings added meaning.
“I’m very flattered,” Matsui said of Ohtani’s Japanese adoration in “Shohei Ohtani: Beyond The Dream,” a Disney+ production released last winter. “Given how far he’s come as a player and how big his presence has been in MLB, to hear Shohei Ohtani look up to me like that when he was in Little League, I’m honored to hear that.”
Shohei Ohtani’s reaction after receiving a ball signed by Hideki Matsui ❤️
Watch the documentary “Shohei Ohtani: Beyond The Dream” tonight at 9 p.m. ET on ESPN 🎬 pic.twitter.com/FAXak4xgw3
–ESPN (@espn) December 17, 2023
Matsui signed a baseball for Ohtani for the project, joking, “I’m sure it’s worth absolutely nothing.”
“That’s awesome,” Ohtani responded in the film when given the ball, later adding, “I’ll cherish that.”
Now he will have another baseball to cherish.
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(Photo: Jayne Kamin-Oncea/Getty Images)