Shohei Ohtani

As a child, Shohei Ohtani was what Japanese would consider a ‘yakyu shonen’, which means a kid who lives, eats, and breathes baseball. That hasn’t changed after all these years. He is still a humble and charming boy from the country on whom fame and fortune have little effect.

He lets his parents take care of his finances. In an effort to develop financial maturity in him, his mother puts about $1,000 every month in his personal bank account, but according to reports, he rarely makes use of it.

Ohtani was born on July 5, 1994, in Ōshū, Iwate, Japan as the youngest of three children. His father, Toru, who was a corporate league baseball player and an employee at the local Mitsubishi plant, encouraged both Ohtani and his older brother Ryuta to play the game. He quickly showed a lot of promise and by the time he turned eight, he was a regular in a weekend little league. His mother was an athlete as well, a national-level badminton player during in high school.

In his youth, Ohtani was inspired by power-hitting left fielder Hideki Matsui, who used to play for Tokyo’s Yomiuri Giants, the only team he watched on television growing up. He was equally fascinated by pitching, but never considered the sport to be anything more than a hobby.

It was at Hanamaki Higashi High School where he studied, that his capability first drew attention. At only 16 years of age, he was throwing in the mid-90s and it took him only a year more to reach 99 mph. Capitalising on his big built—he was six-foot-five when he was 17—he was becoming a dynamic player. However, his rapid growth also resulted in groin and hamstring injuries that bothered him throughout high school.

During this period, his pitching mechanics posed some issues. He could not keep himself in the strike zone as his delivery had become effortful and stiff. The problems eventually went away as he gradually grew into his body.

In the early stages of his career, Shohei Ohtani registered the record of the fastest pitch by a Japanese high school pitcher at 99 mph. He participated in the 2012 18U Baseball World Championship and at the end of the competition, he had the impressive record of 0-1 win-loss with 16 strikeouts, eight walks, five hits, five runs, and a 4.35 earned run average in total 10 1⁄3 innings pitched.

He had made up the decision to go to the US to play in the major leagues after high school. Subsequently, he was at the receiving end of much interest from some of the biggest baseball clubs in the world, including the Texas Rangers, Boston Red Sox, New York Yankees, and Los Angeles Dodgers.

He made his intention of relocating to the US and playing there public on October 21, 2012. However, the Nippon-Ham Fighters under the leadership of their general manager Masao Yamada took a huge risk by choosing him as their first draft pick anyway and spent the next few weeks convincing him to stay in Japan. Among other things, they pointed out that if he stayed in Japan he would not have go through the grind of the US minor leagues and instead, would be able to spend his formative years as a player in MPB, where he could earn millions from a litany of endorsement deals as well as be hailed as a national hero.

He accepted the Fighters’ offer after much consideration, and debuted at 18 as a rightfielder in the Fighters’ first game of the season on March 29, 2013. He had an incredibly successful first year in MPB, garnering a record of 3-0 in 11 starts at the end of the season.

Assigned the jersey number (11) previously worn by legendary Yu Darvish, he was used by the Fighters as a rookie in both outfield and at pitcher. His performance throughout the season both as a batter and pitcher earned him a Pacific League roster spot for the 2013 All-Star Game.

Shohei Ohtani attended the 2015 WBSC Premier 12 as part of the Japanese national team. Held in Japan and Taiwan from November 8 to 21, the tournament was eventually won by South Korea, with the US coming in second, and Japan the third. Ohtani ended the series with the lowest earned run average of the tournament.

He was included in Japan’s 28-man roster for the 2017 World Baseball Classic, but had to drop out after suffering the ankle injury.