The big story in baseball over the last two weeks, and really the world of sports, has been Shohei Ohtani’s former interpreter, Ippei Mizuhara and this whole gambling debacle.

To be honest I didn’t even want to write about it. 

While it’s a compelling story, it’s a sad story. 

And unfortunately, it’s a story that is far too common in everyday, middle class Americans.

Reports show an estimated 2 million Americans have dealt with gambling addiction in a given year.

And with the escalation of online sports gambling, you can imagine that number rapidly increasing. (if it hasn’t already)

Sites like Draftkings, Fanduel, MGM, and many others make it so easy and accessible to throw any amount of money you’d like at just about any sport in the world. 

All of this and I didn’t even bring up how gambling almost destroyed baseball in the early 20th century. Nor have I brought up Pete Rose..

I guess all of that is a story for another day. 

But I decided to dish out a little information on the Ohtani/Ippei scandal, because as baseball fans we need to be educated on what’s going on, not only in the box scores, but in the darker sides of our game.

God knows Major League Baseball will not inform us.

Not even a press conference. 

Must be too busy reporting on the latest bat flip.

So anyway…

If you haven’t been following, here’s what you need to know.

• Shohei’s interpreter and best friend reportedly stole $16 million dollars from Shohei to fuel his gambling addiction.
• He impersonated Shohei,even through phone calls to the bank, to get large sums of money (half a million dollars on at least one occasion) approved to wire to his bookie.
• Between December 2021 through January 2024 Mizuhara placed 19,000 bets
  • Average bet of $12,800
  • Total winning bets: $142 million
  • Total losing bets: $182 million
  • Net total of negative $40 million
• Affidavit does note that the records do not show any bets on baseball 
• Recorded text messages show Mizuhara’s bookie texted him saying “Hey Ippie, it’s 2 o’clock on Friday. I don’t know why you’re not returning my calls. I’m here in Newport Beach and I see [Victim A] walking his dog. I’m just gonna go up and talk to him and ask how I can get in touch with you since you’re not responding? Please call me back immediately.”
  • Scary
• Ohtani gave investigators the OK to search his personal phone
  • It was clean
• Mizuhara turned himself in and has been released on $25,000 bail and an agreement to get gambling addiction help
• He could face up to 30 years in prison for bank fraud 

So with all of this information, we can safely say Shohei is cleared of any gambling allegations. He’s certainly not gambled on baseball. 

There are still questions that will loom over us.

You might ask “how can somebody not notice half a million dollars missing from their bank accounts”

“How would you not know if your best friend is stealing from you and has an absurd gambling addiction”

Fair questions. And I think these and other questions are questions that as baseball fans we deserve to know the answer to. 

Major League Baseball and Ohtani need to make a public statement. Over microphones. And answer questions.

This investigation certainly seems to clear the air for the most part. But why not make it 100%? Get everything out in the open. 

Woudn’t you want that as Commissioner? 

So we can put this entire thing behind us.

Maybe he will. The MLB is still conducting their own investigation.

But let’s be real Major League Baseball will likely just wait for the fog to clear. 

And not say a damn word. 

We haven’t seen anything over Manfreds tenure to think otherwise. 

So for now, we can only go by what we have gives us no reason to question Shohei’s integrity. 

We have to remember that he lives in a world that is 100% different than every single one of us.

So let’s just continue to watch history.

Heres a link to the official federal affidavit.

Click to access ippei-mizuhara-criminal-complaint.pdf