If there’s one thing Shohei Ohtani has been able to do better than any other player since he arrived in the U.S. in 2018, it’s exceed expectations. Through the pressure of coming to MLB, attempting to become the first true two-way player in more than half a century and taking the mantle as the best player in the sport, Ohtani has consistently surpassed what the baseball world thought possible.
After he signed the largest contract in the history of professional sports, a 10-year, $700 million deal with the Dodgers, almost a year ago — a pressure unknown by few athletes in the world — failing to meet every expectation in his first season in L.A. would have been understandable, maybe even likely.
But Ohtani isn’t like many this game has ever seen, and eight years after his arrival and with numerous accolades now on his mantle, the two-way superstar is still exceeding even our highest expectations.
Ohtani captured his first NL MVP Award unanimously on Thursday, marking his second consecutive year winning an MVP award and his third league MVP after he won twice with the Angels. He becomes just the second player in MLB history to win an MVP in both leagues, joining Hall of Famer Frank Robinson.
Coming into this season, an MVP performance from Ohtani was anything but guaranteed. He wasn’t pitching after having offseason elbow surgery. And when the season began with an investigation into his former interpreter, Ippei Mizuhara, for illegal gambling, the likelihood that Ohtani’s focus would be elsewhere was significant. But after he was cleared of any wrongdoing by federal investigators and MLB, Ohtani’s latest remarkable season began in earnest.
New team, new expectations and, in all reality, a new life with his right-hand man no longer around, on or off the field. Once the season started, it took the 2024 NL MVP about a week to get going. He hit his first home run as a Dodger in the team’s ninth game of the season. And once he found his groove, he never lost it.
“I don’t think that was in the script of how we [wanted to] start off this year,” Freddie Freeman said after the World Series, reflecting on the gambling scandal that broke while the team was in South Korea.
“When you start supporting a teammate in his first year, like we did, for him to go out there and have the greatest season, I think, of all time — pretty special.”
It was almost like a movie, watching Ohtani excel at such a preposterously high level. Moment by moment, his season became that much more impressive. Whether it was nearly hitting a ball out of Dodger Stadium, a walk-off grand slam to join the 40-40 club or his three-homer, 10-RBI game to found the 50-50 club, what Ohtani achieved in 2024 was absolutely amazing, even by his standards.
While the Dodgers are often seen as having an embarrassment of riches (which they do), what this season revealed is that they needed Ohtani as much as Ohtani needed a winning organization. When Mookie Betts broke his hand in early June, it was Ohtani who assumed responsibility for igniting the Dodgers’ offense. From the time he took over Betts’ leadoff spot on June 17 until the end of the regular season, Ohtani had a .310/.396/.687 slash line with 35 homers and 44 stolen bases.
The postseason had a similar tone for the game’s best player. In his first MLB postseason game, he blasted a three-run homer against the Padres. He followed that with homers in Games 3 and 4 of the NLCS against the Mets en route to the World Series. And even after dislocating his shoulder and tearing his labrum in the World Series, Ohtani’s presence in the dugout and the batter’s box, despite some painful-looking swings, provided a calming effect for the Dodgers and an intimidating variable for their opponents as L.A. defeated New York in five games.
“He committed to us, and he wanted to play for a championship. For it to kind of come to fruition in his first year is pretty remarkable,” Dodgers manager Dave Roberts said after his team’s World Series-clinching victory. “What Shohei’s done to our ballclub, the Dodger fan base domestically, globally, I just don’t think you can quantify.”
You can easily make the case that Ohtani’s season, with his video-game-like numbers, is one of the greatest baseball has ever seen. After signing for $700 million, Ohtani not only had unprecedented individual success, but also in his first appearance in the postseason, the Dodgers won the World Series. That’s not a bad investment for a team that made money hand over fist with Ohtani as the new face of the franchise.
In 2024, Ohtani became the first player in MLB history to hit 50 home runs, steal 50 bases, win MVP and win the World Series all in one season. It’s difficult to imagine anybody topping a historic season such as that.
But there actually is more left for Ohtani to do because while he was delivering this historic campaign, he was also rehabbing his elbow. And now, with a normal offseason to ramp back up, the three-time MVP will go into 2025 as a staple in L.A.’s rotation, giving the Dodgers another reason to be optimistic about repeating as champions and giving Ohtani another opportunity to make the baseball world marvel.
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