The Allure of Ohtani
When the 2021 Major League Baseball season started, I made one concrete declaration; I was burnt out on MLB and wasn’t going to watch any games this year, including the affiliated minor leagues. I had known for a few years that I was slowly gravitating into being more of an unaffiliated baseball fan anyway. It made sense to slowly let MLB drift away this season. I was enjoying baseball. After all, good, fun, professional baseball being played in other leagues free of all of MLB’s ills that frustrated me so very much. I have, for the most part, been able to keep true to my word, that is, except for Shohei Ohtani.
Now, I haven’t gone and renewed my MLB TV subscription or anything like that. However, I find myself scrolling past 99% of the MLB news that enters my various social media feeds, unless that news involves Ohtani. I watch every video highlight I can, read articles as they become available, and have watched the free games of the week that he’s played in. I’m not giving MLB a second chance, I’m simply continuing my love affair with the best baseball player you, I, or anyone else has ever seen.
I feel like Ohtani is a case where I am allowed a bit of hubris. This is a time where I was on the bandwagon well before anyone else. After all, Ohtani played for my favorite Nippon Professional Baseball team, the Hokkaido Nippon-Ham Fighters. He was doing this two-way thing thousands of miles away at a time when to most baseball fans he was more myth than reality. Only, to myself and others who have followed his career from his pre-MLB days he’s always been a larger-than-life reality.
Watching the best two-way player since Bullet Rogan has been an enjoyable ride. I’m glad that ride has continued into MLB. I’m not here to take on the hipster doofus role of decrying present mainstream Ohtani because I was a big fan before he was mainstream. Hell no. I’m glad he’s gone mainstream and everyone is getting to see the same vibrant and talented ballplayer I watched in Japan. I want nothing more than for him to continue to succeed and to grow even more mythical with each passing day.
That’s the thing with Ohtani; he’s both a myth and a reality rolled into one. We’re all getting to see what he’s accomplishing in real-time. We are watching the same videos, the same games, and the same highlight reels. It’s reality happening right before our eyes yet it’s all so very surreal. There’s no way anyone can be as good at the game of baseball as Ohtani, is there? It’s not actually possible for someone to be a fantastic full-time hitter and pitcher as well as a great outfielder? Yet, night after night Ohtani amazes and lets us see him do things that no living fan has ever been able to see.
I’m not saying anything new about Ohtani. Everyone is now well aware of exactly the sort of mythical figure he has become. You know his stats and reciting them wouldn’t do a lick of good.
But for me, it’s a little different. I was done. I had finally freed myself from caring about MLB and what happened there on a daily basis. It felt great and then Ohtani dragged me back in kicking and screaming. I’m not ready to dive back into the rest of MLB, the organization hasn’t earned my fandom. However, I have all the time in the world for a once-in-a-lifetime human being like Shohei Ohtani. That’s why he is the face of baseball, not just MLB, but baseball. The Ohtani train keeps on rolling and we’re all lucky to be along for the ride.
