Caption: Shohei Ohtani dawns Samurai headgear and celebrates with teammates after a Home Run.

By Ryan Harless

Ryan Harless is a fourth-year undergraduate at BGSU from Hillsboro, Ohio. He is majoring in Sport Management with a Journalism Minor. Baseball and golf at all levels are his primary interests but he is also interested in combat sports, hockey, basketball, and football.

August 13, 2023

The Los Angeles Angels decided to pull (arguably) the greatest baseball player of all time off the trading block in what looks to be a statement move. The Angels have shown baseball that they are doing everything they can to get Shohei Ohtani and Mike Trout to the playoffs.

On the 27^th of July, the Angels announced that they would NOT be trading Ohtani at this year’s deadline. The team then proceeded to acquire pitchers Lucas Giolito and Reynaldo Lopez as well as two players with past ties to the team in C.J. Cron and Randal Grichuk.

They got all four of these players without having to give up much at all and I think they will all be great late-season pickups for LA. However, simply acquiring these players isn’t going to automatically put the team in first place. They are in a very tough division dealing with both the Texas Rangers and the Houston Astros who are currently in first and second place, respectively.

The Angels now sit in fourth place, 12.5 games behind Texas and are six games behind the Seattle Mariners. On top of that, they are 6.5 games back from holding a wild card spot and punching their ticket to the postseason. They trail Tampa Bay, Houston, and Toronto who are all currently in place to get wild card spots as well as Boston and the Yankees who have them by 3 and 4 games respectively.

Now only time will tell if the Angels made the right decision keeping Ohtani for the full year. Some people might be of the opinion that they should have traded Ohtani while they still had control so that they could get something for him. Some might think that they still have a chance for a postseason push, although chances seem to be fading fast.

Many were speculating that a trade deal for Ohtani would be team altering. A team that wanted Ohtani would have more than likely had to give up their top prospects as well as one or two Major League ready players who could fill a roster spot right now. There were very few teams who were willing to make that sort of shift in a franchise and I believe that Angels GM Perry Minasian didn’t want to be remembered as the GM that traded (possibly) the greatest player of all time.

That being said, the biggest question now outside of the will they/won’t they playoff talk, is what team is going to have the funds and ability to pay Shohei Ohtani this offseason?

The Angels seemed to be going into “win now” mode with all of their eggs in the basket for this season, so I would be very surprised to see a resigning. We always have the huge market teams like the Mets, Yankees, Dodgers, and San Diego. Especially with the Mets dealing their 40-year-old, $40 million pitcher (Max Scherzer) to the Rangers and their 43.3 million pitcher (Justin Verlander) to the Astros, they could be selling this year to make salary space for the money Ohtani will command.

I think it is entirely reasonable to assume that Shohei will sign the largest contract in baseball history in terms of average yearly salary. I would even venture to say that paying North of $50 million a year would be more than fair. When you think of all that you are getting with Ohtani OUTSIDE of his pure baseball greatness, you realize that he can entirely change the way the baseball world looks at a team.

He is easily the most marketable player in baseball right now, everyone loves him as a person, he has done wonders in bringing Japanese fans to MLB and expanding that market. In terms of being on a team, what more could you ask of a player?

Another aspect of Ohtani that has been overlooked is the fact that he is a two-way player. So, the way I see it, if you sign him to a long-term deal, even if he starts falling off as either a pitcher or a hitter in a noticeable way, he can just stop doing one and focus on the other. Now, obviously that is a decision that is entirely up to Shohei, but I still think it could be an option in the future.

I think the most reasonable outcome of this upcoming offseason would be a team inking Ohtani to a 1–3-year deal. He is still going to take a ton of money a year to play so I can’t see many teams committing to Ohtani at his price for much more than that.

As of today, Ohtani is slashing .302/.403/.680 with a 1.083 OPS, a 187 OPS+, 39 HR, 7 triples, and 66 walks. He is leading MLB in all of those stats minus his .302 average.

As a pitcher he is 9-5 with a 3.43 ERA, 131 ERA+, 156 strikeouts and has only given up 18 HR in 120.2 innings pitched. He is also leading the MLB with 5.9 hits per 9 innings.

He is clearly dominant in all facets of his game. He made this incredibly evident on the 27^th of July during an Angels doubleheader. In the first game, Ohtani was the starting pitcher and threw a complete game shutout which is becoming increasingly rare in today’s game. He was hitless in the first game going 0-5 at the plate, but once pitching wasn’t on his mind, he let us know. In the second game of the day, Ohtani hit not one but TWO homers furthering his home run lead over everyone else in Major League Baseball. I was super excited for this trade deadline in the MLB and as exciting as it has been, I am super stoked to get to watch the Shohei sweepstakes unfold over this offseason.