The sports world is waiting for Ohtani to address the media Monday for the first time since allegations surfaced last week of illegal gambling and the theft of at least $4.5 million (U.S.) by his interpreter.
Baseball’s biggest, brightest and most exciting star — now embroiled in scandal.
The sports world is waiting for Shohei Ohtani, the pitching and hitting sensation for the Los Angeles Dodgers, to address the media Monday for the first time since allegations surfaced last week of illegal gambling and theft of at least $4.5 million (U.S.) by his interpreter, Ippei Mizuhara. No time for his press conference has been announced, but the Dodgers play an exhibition game at 9:10 p.m. ET and Ohtani is expected to talk before or after the game.
Here’s what we know so far:
Who is Ippei Mizuhara?
Mizuhara has worked with Ohtani as an interpreter since 2013. That’s when Mizuhara began translating for English-speaking players on the Hokkaido Nippon-Ham Fighters, the baseball team in Sapporo, Japan that signed Ohtani that same year.
When Ohtani signed with the Los Angeles Angels in 2017, Mizuhara moved with Ohtani and became his personal interpreter. He maintained the same position when Ohtani signed a 10-year, $700-million (US) contract — the largest in North American sports history — with the Dodgers this off-season. The Blue Jays were believed to have been one of the final teams in the running to sign Ohtani.
Ohtani and Mizuhara were close friends. “They’ve transcended friendship into brotherhood,” one former teammate told ESPN last summer.
$1 million in wire transfers — in Ohtani’s name
Federal investigators are digging into an alleged illegal gambling operation run by Mathew Bowyer, a bookmaker in Southern California, according to ESPN.
Bank data reviewed by the outlet showed Ohtani’s name — under “Shohei Otani,” his legal name — on two payments of $500,000 (U.S.) sent to Bowyer last fall. The payments were first flagged by authorities in January.
Sports gambling is illegal in California.
Did Ohtani agree to pay debt?
When ESPN asked Ohtani’s camp about the wire transfers, a recently-hired crisis communications spokesperson told the outlet Ohtani paid the gambling debts on Mizuhara’s behalf. “Yeah, I sent several large payments. That’s the maximum amount I could send,” the spokesperson quoted Ohtani as saying.
One day later, Mizuhara spoke to ESPN for 90 minutes. He confirmed the original story, saying he met Bowyer at a poker game in 2021 and started betting on multiple sports, not including baseball, shortly after. By the end of 2022, Mizuhara had lost over $1 million, he told ESPN.
When his debt rose to $4 million in 2023, Mizuhara said he told Ohtani about it for the first time and Ohtani agreed to pay it, although he “didn’t have any clue” the money was owed to a bookie. Mizuhara said they logged into Ohtani’s bank account together and sent eight or nine transfers of $500,000 each.
Ohtani spokesman accuses Mizuhara of theft
The Dodgers, playing MLB’s opening series in South Korea, informed their players after the game that a negative story was coming, ESPN reported. Andrew Friedman, president of baseball operations, told the team Ohtani helped cover his interpreter’s gambling losses.
But on the way back to the team hotel, Ohtani began asking questions about what was said in the clubhouse. It’s then, a spokesperson told ESPN, that Ohtani first discovered money missing from his bank account.
The spokesperson then told ESPN that “Ippei was lying” and later, Ohtani’s lawyers issued a statement: “In the course of responding to recent media inquiries, we discovered that Shohei has been the victim of a massive theft and we are turning the matter over to the authorities.”
Ohtani’s spokesman later explained the discrepancy by saying Mizuhara continued interpreting for Ohtani and was able to control the information that got to him, until a team interpreter was brought in to tell Dodgers players what was happening.
“(Ohtani) didn’t know what the f— was going on,” the spokesman told ESPN.
A lawyer for Bowyer, the alleged bookmaker, later told The Associated Press that Bowyer “never had any contact with Shohei Ohtani, in person, on the phone, in any way.” The only person he had contact with, the lawyer said, was Mizuhara.
The Dodgers fired Mizuhara shortly before ESPN’s story was published.
MLB, IRS announce investigations
The Internal Revenue Service opened a criminal investigation into Mizuhara, as well as Bowyer, on Thursday.
One day later, Major League Baseball also opened a formal investigation into “the allegations involving Shohei Ohtani and Ippei (Mizuhara) from the news media.”
The league bars betting on baseball by players and team employees. Betting on a game they are connected to can result in a permanent ban from the sport. Bowyer’s lawyer told the AP that Mizuhara bet on international soccer, not baseball.
Some of the biggest scandals in the sport’s history have stemmed from gambling. Eight players on the 1919 Chicago White Sox — nicknamed the Black Sox — were banned for life for allegedly fixing the World Series that year. And in 1989, Pete Rose — MLB’s all-time hits leader — was banned for life after he was found to have bet on the Cincinnati Reds while playing for and managing the team.
