For the benefit of Korea’s rabid baseball fans, the Los Angeles Dodgers and San Diego Padres provided about the best show one could possibly imagine in their “Korea Series” in Seoul. Thousands of Koreans and hundreds of Americans who’d flown here for the games loved the display of big-league prowess in Seoul’s Gocheok Sky Dome.
Who could have imagined, however, that the big news from the games, in which the American players showed off their stuff in four exhibition contests against Korean teams and then opened the 2024 season with two games against each other, could wind up in the scandal surrounding the Japanese baseball superstar, Shohei Ohtani?
Most people in the stands had no inkling of what was going on away from the field, but by the time the Dodgers were on their way back to Los Angeles, the news was everywhere. Ohtani’s long-time interpreter had been fired after the first Dodgers-Padres game and Ohtani would have a lot of explaining to do. What was his understanding with the interpreter, a Japanese American named Ippei Mizuhara, who’d been his linguistic liaison for all six of his years with the Los Angeles Angels before he signed a 10-year contract worth $700 million with the Dodgers?
After watching Ohtani in all his games at the Sky Dome, my first reaction was that he had been completely cheated, robbed and otherwise exploited by Mizuhara, who is alleged to have taken at least $4.5 million from Ohtani’s coffers to pay off gambling debts. How could it be otherwise for the affable, polite Ohtani.
But then I remembered the sad tale of Shoeless Joe Jackson, the superstar of the Chicago White Sox, whose brilliant career ended amid charges that he was one of eight players on the Sox who conspired to throw the 1919 World Series to the Cincinnati Reds.
“Say It Ain’t So, Joe,” was the headline over a column in the Chicago Daily News as the scandal broke. No one wanted to believe that Shoeless Joe, at 32, batting in the high 300’s, had been involved in throwing the 1919 World Series to the Cincinnati Reds. Now fans and teammates might be saying, “Say it ain’t so, Sho,” the nickname by which Shohei Ohtani is known by his teammates.
Ohtani did just that, saying he had known nothing about what his trusted friend and interpreter had done, that Ippei’s claims to have talked about it with him were “all lies” and he was “beyond shock.”
In fact, Ohtani appears likely to escape from the scandal while investigators pursue Mizuhara for a range of possible charges. Ohtani’s lawyers are claiming outright theft from their superstar client’s accounts, but whatever they say, people will be asking whether Ohtani said, sure, take the money and pay me back when you get lucky.
Then too we wonder on whom Mizuhara was betting. He reportedly said he was placing his money on soccer games, but who’s going to prove it? If Mizuhara was betting on baseball, the question will be whether Ohtani knew it or, heaven forbid, condoned it.
For a major league baseball player to bet on the game is about the worst offense he can commit. Pete Rose, possibly the greatest player in the history of the sport, got himself banned for life from professional baseball for betting on games while manager of the Cincinnati Reds.
Right now the minimum sentence for anyone with a team to bet on a baseball game is a one-year suspension from pro ball. That may not be so bad. Not infrequently players have to give up the game due to injuries, maybe even sore arms. If a player keeps in shape, plays overseas, maybe in Korea, he can still theoretically return to the U.S. and sign on with an MLB team.
The rules are posted in the club house for each team. Ohtani would be well aware of the stupidity of messing up his career by telling Mizuhara, while you’re at it, why don’t we place a little money on today’s game?
Since the Rose scandal, there’ve been no stories of players or team employees risking their careers by gambling on baseball. That is, until now. Let us hope this one blows over and is forgotten except by Korean fans. They can still be proud to say they saw the great player in action right here in Seoul on the day the news broke.
Donald Kirk www.donaldkirk.com, writes mainly about the confrontation of forces in Asia from Seoul and Washington.
'Say it ain’t so, Sho'
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0
28.03.2024
For the benefit of Korea’s rabid baseball fans, the Los Angeles Dodgers and San Diego Padres provided about the best show one could possibly imagine in their “Korea Series” in Seoul. Thousands of Koreans and hundreds of Americans who’d flown here for the games loved the display of big-league prowess in Seoul’s Gocheok Sky Dome.
Who could have imagined, however, that the big news from the games, in which the American players showed off their stuff in four exhibition contests against Korean teams and then opened the 2024 season with two games against each other, could wind up in the scandal surrounding the Japanese baseball superstar, Shohei Ohtani?
Most people in the stands had no inkling of what was going on away from the field, but by the time the Dodgers were on their way back to Los Angeles, the news was everywhere. Ohtani’s long-time interpreter had been fired after the first Dodgers-Padres game and Ohtani would have a lot of explaining to do. What was his understanding with the interpreter, a Japanese American named Ippei Mizuhara, who’d been his........
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