Source: Ohtani’s reps ask for probe into theft
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Tisha Thompson, ESPN
Representatives of Los Angeles Dodgers superstar Shohei Ohtani have contacted law enforcement authorities and asked them to investigate a “massive theft” of money from the player, a source with direct knowledge told ESPN on Thursday.
The source declined to say which agency had been contacted.
A Major League Baseball source told ESPN on Thursday that the league has not been contacted by federal authorities. The source said MLB’s next step would be to gather facts, which could take time in light of the ongoing federal investigation.
On Wednesday, lawyers for the Dodgers pitcher and designated hitter said he had been “a victim of a massive theft” after reporters asked an Ohtani spokesman questions about why $4.5 million in wire transfers had been sent from Ohtani’s bank account to a bookmaking operation.
The theft allegation came after his spokesman initially told ESPN that the slugger had transferred the funds to cover the gambling debts of Ohtani’s former interpreter and friend, Ippei Mizuhara.
Mizuhara on Tuesday evening told ESPN the same and laid out his story in great detail, including saying that Ohtani had sat with him, and the two transferred the money in $500,000 increments in several different settings. But as ESPN prepared to publish a story Wednesday, the spokesman disavowed Mizuhara’s account.
In a subsequent interview with Mizuhara, he told ESPN he had not been truthful — that Ohtani had no knowledge of his gambling activities, debts or efforts to repay him.
On Thursday, a source close to Ohtani gave an explanation for the changing storylines: As Ohtani’s handlers tried to determine what had happened, they initially relied solely on Mizuhara, who continued to translate for Ohtani.
After Wednesday’s season-opening game in South Korea, Dodgers officials called a clubhouse meeting and told players a negative story was coming later in the day, a team official said, and Mizuhara apologized, saying he had a gambling addiction. It was then, the official said, that Ohtani understood for the first time what was happening and began asking questions.
When asked Wednesday if he had interpreted anything incorrectly on purpose, Mizuhara told ESPN, “No, I have never done that.”
Mizuhara, when asked by ESPN on Wednesday afternoon if he had been accused of theft, said he was told he could not comment but declined to say by whom. He did not respond to a subsequent question about whether he had taken any money without Ohtani’s knowledge.
The developments this week came as federal investigators are examining the operation run by Southern California bookmaker Mathew Bowyer. The wire-transfer payments were sent from Ohtani’s account to an associate of Bowyer’s, according to multiple sources and bank data reviewed by ESPN.
IRS spokesperson Scott Villiard confirmed to ESPN on Thursday night that it is investigating Mizuhara and Bowyer. There is no evidence that the IRS investigation was triggered by a request from Ohtani’s representatives, and Villiard declined to answer whether it was.
Multiple sources, including Mizuhara, told ESPN that Ohtani does not gamble and that the funds covered Mizuhara’s losses.
ESPN had reviewed bank information showing Ohtani’s name on two $500,000 payments sent in September and October.
While sports betting is legal in nearly 40 states, it remains illegal in California. Government-regulated sportsbooks require bettors to pay up front for their wagers, while illegal bookmakers accept bets on credit.
Sources close to the gambling operation told ESPN that Bowyer dealt directly with Mizuhara, who placed bets on international soccer matches and other sports — but not baseball — starting in 2021. A source said Bowyer was aware of the name on the wire transfers but chose not to ask any questions as long as payments came in; however, the source said Bowyer allowed people to believe Ohtani was a client in order to boost business.
“Mr. Bowyer never met or spoke with Shohei Ohtani,” Bowyer’s attorney, Diane Bass, told ESPN. She declined to answer any other questions.
Mizuhara and Ohtani are friends in addition to their professional relationship. Mizuhara has interpreted for Ohtani since the star moved to the United States in 2018, accompanying the two-way player in dugouts, locker rooms, player lounges, on trips, in media settings and elsewhere, making Mizuhara highly recognizable to baseball fans.
He has been the interpreter for Ohtani with team managers and coaches and goes over scouting reports with Ohtani during games. The two are rarely separated. Mizuhara runs errands for the pitcher, carries his water bottle and is so ever-present that an Ohtani teammate once referred to the duo as having a “brotherhood” that goes beyond friendship.
Mizuhara had a contract with the Los Angeles Angels when Ohtani played there and signed with the Dodgers this offseason. Mizuhara confirmed to ESPN he has been paid between $300,000 and $500,000 annually. He was fired by the Dodgers on Wednesday.
Mizuhara told ESPN on Tuesday his bets were placed on international soccer, the NBA, the NFL and college football.
“I never bet on baseball,” Mizuhara said. “That’s 100%. I knew that rule. … We have a meeting about that in spring training.”
MLB players and employees are allowed to bet on sports other than baseball but not with illegal bookmakers or offshore websites. The league rulebook states that bets placed with illegal bookmakers are subject to punishment at the commissioner’s discretion.
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Tim Keown
TOKYO — Shohei Ohtani seems impervious to a variety of conditions that afflict most humans — nerves, anxiety, distraction — but it took playing a regular-season big-league game in his home country to change all of that.
After the Los Angeles Dodgers‘ Opening Day 4-1 win over the Chicago Cubs in the Tokyo Dome, Ohtani made a surprising admission. “It’s been a while since I felt this nervous playing a game,” he said. “It took me four or five innings.”
Ohtani had two hits and scored twice, and one of his outs was a hard liner that left his bat at more than 96 mph, so the nerves weren’t obvious from the outside. But clearly the moment, and its weeklong buildup, altered his usually stoic demeanor.
“I don’t think I’ve ever seen Shohei nervous,” Dodgers manager Dave Roberts said. “But one thing I did notice was how emotional he got during the Japanese national anthem. I thought that was telling.”
As the Dodgers began the defense of last year’s World Series win, it became a night to showcase the five Japanese players on the two teams. For the first time in league history, two Japanese pitchers — the Dodgers’ Yoshinobu Yamamoto and the Cubs’ Shota Imanaga — faced each other on Opening Day. Both pitched well, with Imanaga throwing four hitless innings before being removed after 69 pitches.
“Seventy was kind of the number we had for Shota,” Cubs manager Craig Counsell said. “It was the right time to take him out.”
The Dodgers agreed, scoring three in the fifth inning off reliever Ben Brown. Imanaga kept the Dodgers off balance, but his career-high four walks created two stressful innings that ran up his pitch count.
Yamamoto rode the adrenaline of pitching in his home country, routinely hitting 98 with his fastball and vexing the Cubs with a diving splitter over the course of five three-hit innings. He threw with a kind of abandon, finding a freedom that often eluded him last year in his first year in America.
“I think last year to this year, the confidence and conviction he has throwing the fastball in the strike zone is night and day,” Roberts said. “If he can continue to do that, I see no reason he won’t be in the Cy Young conversation this season.”
Cubs right fielder Seiya Suzuki went hitless in four at bats — the Cubs had only three hits, none in the final four innings against four relievers out of the Dodgers’ loaded bullpen — and rookie Roki Sasaki will make his first start of his Dodger career in the second and final game of the series Wednesday.
“I don’t think there was a Japanese baseball player in this country who wasn’t watching tonight,” Roberts said.
The Dodgers were without Mookie Betts, who left Japan on Monday after it was decided his illness would not allow him to play in this series. And less than an hour before game time, first baseman Freddie Freeman was scratched with what the team termed “left rib discomfort,” a recurrence of an injury he first sustained during last year’s playoffs.
The night started with a pregame celebration that felt like an Olympic opening ceremony in a lesser key. There were Pikachus on the field and a vaguely threatening video depicting the Dodgers and Cubs as Monster vs. Monster. World home-run king Saduharu Oh was on the field before the game, and Roberts called meeting Oh “a dream come true.”
For the most part, the crowd was subdued, as if it couldn’t decide who or what to root for, other than Ohtani. It was admittedly confounding: throughout the first five innings, if fans rooted for the Dodgers they were rooting against Imanaga, but rooting for the Cubs meant rooting against Yamamoto. Ohtani, whose every movement is treated with a rare sense of wonder, presented no such conflict.
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