Dodgers fire Ohtanis long time interpreter, accused of 'massive theft'
 

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">The Los Angeles Dodgers fire Ippei Mizuhara, Shohei Ohtani&#39;s long-time interpreter.<br>Mizuhara was accused by Ohtani&#39;s attorneys of engaging in a “massive theft” of Ohtani&#39;s funds to place bets with an illegal bookmaker, according to the LA Times.</p>&mdash; Bob Nightengale (@BNightengale) <a href="https://twitter.com/BNightengale/status/1770567153202376865?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">March 20, 2024</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

Wrinkle to the story is Mizuhara said yesterday he'd stood over Ohtanis shoulder as Ohtani personally wired the money to the illegal bookie. Now today Ohtanis Lawyers and the Dodgers are saying Ohtani had no knowledge whatsoever.




Initially, a spokesman for Ohtani told ESPN the slugger had transferred the funds to cover Mizuhara's gambling debt. The spokesman presented Mizuhara to ESPN for a 90-minute interview Tuesday night, during which Mizuhara laid out his account in great detail. However, as ESPN prepared to publish the story Wednesday, the spokesman disavowed Mizuhara's account and said Ohtani's lawyers would issue 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," read the statement from Berk Brettler LLP.

The spokesman declined to answer any further questions, and the statement did not specify whom they believe perpetrated the alleged theft

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 last September and October.

In the Tuesday interview arranged by Ohtani's spokesman, Mizuhara, 39, told ESPN that he asked Ohtani last year to pay off his gambling debt, which multiple sources said had ballooned to at least $4.5 million. Mizuhara said that he previously had placed bets via DraftKings and assumed bets placed through Bowyer were legal.

"I want everyone to know Shohei had zero involvement in betting. I want people to know I did not know this was illegal. I learned my lesson the hard way. I will never do sports betting ever again."

But on Wednesday afternoon, Mizuhara told ESPN that Ohtani had no knowledge of his gambling debts and that Ohtani had not transferred money to the bookmaker's associate.

Mizuhara told ESPN on Tuesday his bets were 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."

After Ohtani agreed to pay the debts, Mizuhara said on Tuesday, Ohtani logged onto his own computer and sent the wire transfers under Mizuhara's supervision in installments over several months last year. They added "loan" to the description field in the transactions.

Asked why Ohtani didn't simply give him the money instead of paying Bowyer's associate directly, Mizuhara said Ohtani didn't trust him with the money. "He didn't want me to gamble it away," Mizuhara said.

Mizuhara, though, Wednesday afternoon, walked back much of what he had said late Tuesday, saying Ohtani had no knowledge of his gambling activities, debts or efforts to repay them.

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">I think any coverage of this from here out has to start with the fact that Ohtani’s team has already changed its story <a href="https://t.co/Z2nM6faCdB">https://t.co/Z2nM6faCdB</a></p>&mdash; Barry Petchesky (@barry) <a href="https://twitter.com/barry/status/1770574974484447522?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">March 20, 2024</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

This seems like it could be good. I would have assumed his interpreter was employed, or at least, largely vetted by him.

Pete Rose says Hi


Which is an absolute crime he isn’t in the Hall of Fame.

Ohtani has been in America for like 7 years now... and he still needs an interpreter?

Suspicious.

Learn English already.

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LMAO No shit. Stole millions but was still chill enough with Ohtani to be hanging out with him in the dugout in Korea today.

I don't know what the exact word is, maybe naivety, but Ohtani and Mizuhara may have already permanently ****ed his career permanently by what they've admitted.

This sucks big time if true.

Ohtani is the only reason I care about MLB currently.

HA!

Jesus no.

MLB will move heaven and earth to distance Ohtani from this. He's a golden goose both in the states and internationally. And playing for their present crown jewel franchise.

He gonna be fine.

I'm assuming so as well, unless the federal investigation uncovers Ohtani being directly involved with the gambling. Might not be too much the MLB can do then.

Ohtani is about to take a 2 year hiatus from baseball and join the NHL.

I knew he was a complete scumbag as soon as he signed with the Dodgers

**** anything to do with Todd Boehly.

nie hou. xie xie!

Konnichiwa mother ****er

We'll only know if this story is true if he retires to pursue his dream of playing G league basketball

in related news, the Dodgers have hired Michael Jordan as a team consultant...

Oh yea the coverup is in full swing already. Nobody is buying this bullshit theft story.

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Pete Rose says "Hey"

Long way from getting there. In order from best to worst in magnitude

Gambling
Gambling on sports
Gambling on your own team
Making lineup decisions because of games you bet on (or in Pete Rose's case... Games you didn't bet on)
Throwing games for money (shoeless Joe... And if you don't believe that, check out his stats in world series games he won vs lost)

For now we don't know if shohei is Calvin ridley or Pete rose

Why would a team-employed interpreter have access to the players money, unless...ohhhhhhh.

The interpreter will commit seppuku as expected. The story will be over.

Even a Calvin Ridley punishment, or what those Iowa and Iowa State players got would be deadly for him

I wonder if the Yakuza are involved somehow.

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">This is why we never paid for interpreters</p>&mdash; Montreal Expos (@Montreal_Expos) <a href="https://twitter.com/Montreal_Expos/status/1770574098613047446?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">March 20, 2024</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

Openly mixing gambling with sports is going swimmingly.

What the - ? Was that the rookie seminar? Why would you expose the rookies to bad influences like Cris Carter and Warren Sapp? Was Michael Irvin the next speaker? Rae Carruth?

I agree. If true he deserves what those guys got, but i suspect if this is what it is the league would be willing to sweep it under the rug if it didn't hurt integrity of the game. And that's unfortunate for superstar treatment. But ridleys punishment was arguably a lot of more about setting an example than, say, steroids which affects integrity of the game.

I wonder if he went full Pete Rose and sold steroids too?

ESPN fired him for the comments but I think a lot of people knew it was true.

Nothing about the stories Shohei/his team/his interpreter were putting out there about this add up.

Think that was his son?

Daddy was the guy who was banging teenagers

We'll see. So far they're bumbling and stumbling through the explanation.:shrug:

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Ohtani vs Michael Jordan at 4am in Vegas at the blackjack table <a href="https://t.co/TSjoG61Qsr">pic.twitter.com/TSjoG61Qsr</a></p>&mdash; Noah �� (@Yordan4HOF2) <a href="https://twitter.com/Yordan4HOF2/status/1770578505060782560?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">March 20, 2024</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

Sure feels like best case scenario he did something suspendable and the mlb knows their option is to either suspend a money maker in a mega market or get blasted for superstar treatment. I think as someone else said the unique aspect of this is that even a slight infraction can be devastating for his brand

I see Ohtani as MLBs Mahomes.

They will keep him safe 100%

Brings in too much money for MLB, USA and Japan

Lmao, this is all a bunch of horse shit. Ohtani was gambling and theyre doing some massive coverup.

Dodgers Rule

No kidding.

The “interpreter” was just a cover and is now the fall guy… does anyone really think Ohtani legit needed a full time interpreter… around him at all times and in the club house… after living in America for almost a decade?

No bookie is taking 4 million dollar loses to a ****ing interpreter.

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="et" dir="ltr">Shohei Ohtani in between innings <a href="https://t.co/D06H5ydQTg">pic.twitter.com/D06H5ydQTg</a></p>&mdash; Jeremy (@Pimp_Lord619) <a href="https://twitter.com/Pimp_Lord619/status/1770606565026066779?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">March 21, 2024</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

Ohh I hope the dodgers get ****ed. Imagine the biggest current star getting banned.

All LA teams are scum and when that shithole falls into the ocean America will rejoice

Or that the interpreter who's lived here for 25 years didn't realize that the illegal ****ing bookie wasn't the same as DraftKings?

What happened here is just so damn obvious but ultimately so impossible to prove that it's gonna have to go away. But yeah - Ohtani better get himself to a Gamber's Anonymous meeting if he's out there blowing millions on soccer games.

Because ain't no way some random bookie was taking millions in action from Ohtani's lackey. At best the guy was doing it on his own but with Othani's knowledge. And I'd still say it's more likely he was doing it at Ohtani's behest than it is that Shohei's just a really generous dude that covered nearly $5 million on gambling losses for his interpreter because he's just a nice guy that way...

I realize they travel all over the country but DraftKings isn’t even legal in California. None of this adds up.

Vlad Guerrero JR was born in Canada lived a lot of his life in Canada and US and still uses an interpreter.

MLB can't get out of its own way, can it?

****ing up in the 1994 lockout, then the steroid era, squandering the marketability of its best player of the 2010s in Trout and now probably being complicit in an even bigger star's gambling cover-up.

In fairness, the steroid era exploded the popularity of baseball and brought it back to it's pre-strike levels. It was how they navigated their way out of it that created an issue (i.e. they ignored it until they got beaten over the head with it rather than walk away from the table when they got up a couple grand...). Had MLB gotten back to level and then said "okay fellas, lets put some testing in" before Bonds head swelled up 6 sizes, they'd have been in really nice shape and the steroid era would've actually been a huge benefit for baseball.

And MLB didn't do anything to waste Trout - that was Arte Moreno. It's no different than the Chargers and Herbert. Do we blame the NFL for the Lions wasting Barry Sanders and Calvin Johnson? Nope - that's the Lions fault.

They made some good changes last season to make the game a little more watchable. I still think they need to consider moving the mound back a little more given the explosion in velocity and how pitching dominates. And I've long said the game would be significantly better if they moved the walls back across the board (though some stadiums simply can't do that).

Raw stuff has just gotten way too nasty these days. Hell, baseball as originally designed wasn't SUPPOSED to generate swings and misses. The whole "hit it back up the box" thing goes back to the days when pitchers literally stood in a box and the goal was to give guys something to hit but not something too easy to hit. So pitchers would change their angles by moving around this box that's roughly where the mound is today.

Strikeouts are boring. And besides that they're fascist. Throw some groundballs - it's more democratic.

I’m a little unclear on sports gambling rules. So if he gambled all that on other sports besides baseball, that’s ok. Main issue is putting it through an illegal bookie and/or potentially betting in a state or country where sports betting isn’t allowed, right? So where does that fall on the punishment scale assuming he doesn’t get superstar treatment?

1) Right, Baseball didn't handle the 'roid revelations the right way.

2) Key word with Trout is marketability, not "wasting" his competitive power by not winning anything more than one or two postseason appearances.

3) Lower the mound again?

sounds totally fishy. I think before its over we have a modern day Pete Rose

Ohtani doesn't speak english but he knows what CRAPS is.

I don’t think we can go that far yet. As of right now it might be Calvin Ridley except with a lot more superstar status

Put Pete in the hall

And Bonds, and Clemens

Yes and yes!

Pete doesn’t belong in the hall. He broke the cardinal rule and I’m ok with that being unforgivable.

If shohei broke those same rules then same rules apply. But I doubt he did.

**** that high horse bullshit. He was the greatest hitter of his day, maybe all time.

I don’t know where I stand on that because every damn person was doing it and the mlb is complicit. It’s a gray area. Betting on your own team is a clear ban hammer though.

If you want to preserve the integrity of the game you can’t have players or coaches grooving games and screwing over fans and competitive balance to make a quick buck. You have to set an example and now it’s more important than ever.

It isn’t moral high horse. There is a lot of forgiveness for scumbags, criminals and even cheaters. But betting on your team is a mortal sin and it should be.

Patriots were caught cheating multiple times and Brady and Belichick are going into the Hall. Manning had illegal hgh delivered under his wife's name. Why is baseball so upitty about keeping legends out of the Hall?

I agree there are lots of players in baseball who are blackballed for the wrong reason. Curt schilling is an obvious one. But gambling on your own team is a whole different animal.

Y’all think Ohtani has the stereotypical large athlete cock or the stereotypical Asian tiny cock?

I think there’s generally a lot more forgiveness for cheating to gain competitive advantage than there is trying to groove games.

And in games Pete rose didn’t bet he wasn’t trying to win those games.

Pete Rose was an overrated compiler who lived on hollow singles and refused to quite when he should've because he was a shameless stat-chaser who prioritized his numbers over his team's record.

His last 1,500 hits came when he was an average, at best, big league hitter. And for his last 1,000 of those he was fairly well worthless. And since he couldn't play defense and he played in the National League, they had to plug him in at 1b where dragging along a weak hitter is doubly damaging.

"Hey Mike Schmidt - we know you guys missed the playoffs by 2 games in '82 and the Cardinals ended up winning in your place while Pete Rose gave you absolutely ****-all at 1b - but hey, he hit 150 singles that year, man!"

Pete Rose wasn't the greatest anything of his day, certainly not of all time.

He might be - might be - one of the 25 best hitters of all time. But he wasn't even the best hitter on his own team during his day. That was Mike Schmidt. He's not the greatest switch hitter of all time - that's Mickey Mantle and/or Chipper Jones. He's not the greatest contact hitter of all time - that's Tony Gwynn.

He's just a guy that put up numbers because he refused to quit and his team refused to fire him.

Pete "it's been 55 years babe" Rose is just fine where he's at...

Don't wanna get banned for life? Don't sign a deal banning you for life to save your own skin.

Ain't that hard.

Red rocket cause he's got that dog in him.

You shut your whore mouth DJ! Pete Rose is my baseball Jesus.

The American pastime just opened its season in South Korea.

Plenty Asian baseball players use interpreters. There’s nothing suspicious about it.

Well he certainly has the martyr half of it down pat...

Vonn Miller followed by Bill Romonowski, while Elway led the anti-drinking campaign.

Some valid points here that I had never really considered (mainly because I despised the teams he played for), but you do seem focused on over-the-hill Rose while ignoring young Rose. It's hard to ignore his contributions to the Reds back in the day. And as the fat guy from Moneyball would point out, he did get on base.

It is hard to feel sorry for him, though. Rose's biggest enemy has always been Rose.

This is a total bs cover story. What kind of illegal bookie fronts an interpreter $4 million? GTFO with that for shit story.

I put Pete Rose on the same level as Tony Gwynn. Both were slap hitters with no power and if they played today they'd be completely out of there element.

Never had much respect for Rose after he broke Fosse's leg on an aggressive slide at home in a freaking all-star game.