Where he went, what he saw, what he took away<\/p>\n
For the first three weeks after his retirement, in August 2024, Votto helped take care of his mother after she had ankle surgery. Then, he said, \u201clike a good boy, I asked permission: \u2018Hey, can I leave now? Are you OK enough that I can leave now?\u2019 And she said yes. And I hopped on a plane, and I started in Italy. \u2026\u201d<\/p>\n
Ready for just a partial rundown of his travelogue? Here it comes.<\/p>\n
\u201cI spent three months in Japan,\u201d he said. \u201cI spent a ton of time in Europe. I visited Auschwitz-Birkenau. I\u2019ve seen Petra in Jordan. I\u2019ve been to all kinds of stuff \u2014 all the stuff to visit in Egypt. \u2026 I\u2019ve been all over. I spent tons of time in Spain, Mexico, continuing to refine my Spanish.<\/p>\n
\u00a0\u201cAnd I just had a really lovely time exploring, and trying the very best I could to \u2018small\u2019 myself. And I think exposing yourself to the world and realizing how so few people care (that he was a famous baseball player in another life) \u2026 I think it helped my well-being.\u201d<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/GettyImages-1469055427-scaled.jpg\")
<\/p>\n
\n Joey Votto said that during his adventures he\u2019s been \u201ctrying the very best I could to \u2018small\u2019 myself.\u201d (Steph Chambers \/ Getty Images)<\/p>\n
The most ubiquitous man in the world is a baseball player<\/p>\n
In all those months of roaming the globe, Votto was never out there searching for baseball. But that didn\u2019t mean baseball didn\u2019t appear in his viewfinder from time to time.<\/p>\n
As he strolled the streets of Tokyo, he couldn\u2019t help but notice that there apparently is this superhero named Ohtani. You may be familiar with him. And that man they call Shohei seemed to be waiting for Votto, every time he turned another corner.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen you walk through Tokyo, Shohei Ohtani is ubiquitous,\u201d he said. \u201cHe\u2019s on every single building, every vending machine, every pharmacy, every product. I mean, I can\u2019t think of an apt comparison to him. \u2026 I can\u2019t think of anybody comparable in my life.\u201d<\/p>\n
So was there a moment, I asked, when Ohtani came to bat across the Pacific and \u2014 because the entire country was watching on TV \u2014 everything stopped?<\/p>\n
\u201cInteresting that you asked that question,\u201d Votto replied \u2014 because it was almost the opposite!<\/p>\n
\u201cSo the timing of Dodgers games is approximately 11 o\u2019clock in the morning in Japan,\u201d he said. \u201cAnd I injured my intercostal, my rib, surfing when I was in Sri Lanka. I flew to Tokyo afterward, and it was really bothering me. So I had to get physical therapy in Tokyo. \u2026 And every day, while I was laying on the table, they had the game on, and it was always the Dodgers game. \u2026<\/p>\n
\u201cSo while I was laying on the table watching it, I\u2019m locked in, because I think he\u2019s must-see TV. And they (the Japanese fans in the room) were watching, (but) they were, you know, casual. I think it\u2019s because he\u2019s just so common there.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou turn your shoulder, and it\u2019s Shohei Ohtani on a billboard. Or he\u2019s on the product you buy at CVR, which is like Walgreens there. Or he\u2019s on your rice ball, that sort of thing. So I think it\u2019s almost like \u2026 it\u2019s (not like they\u2019re) tired of him. I don\u2019t want to speak to their mindset. But he\u2019s just everywhere, including in a Dodgers uniform.\u201d<\/p>\n
In other words, do the Japanese just take this superhero act for granted by now?<\/p>\n
\u00a0\u201cI don\u2019t know,\u201d Votto said. \u201cIt\u2019s almost like it\u2019s in the flow of: He\u2019s done it for so long that the greatness is expected. \u2026 He\u2019s 31 years old, and he\u2019s been around for a long time, and he\u2019s just so great, he\u2019s made it mundane.\u201d<\/p>\n
Does Votto ever dream about playing baseball?<\/p>\n
Votto is on the other side of 40 now. He hasn\u2019t played in an official (non-spring training) MLB game for 32 months. So his glory days are deep in the rear-view mirror. But he\u2019s a man with many thoughts \u2014 baseball thoughts and otherwise \u2014 constantly swirling above his eyebrows. So I asked him:<\/p>\n
\u201cDo you ever dream about baseball? Do you ever dream you\u2019re still playing baseball?\u201d<\/p>\n
He was mostly trying to answer: No. But that would have been the least Votto-esque answer ever. So instead, he entertained a fantasy about what might have been \u2014 and what he might be doing right now in that alternate universe.<\/p>\n
Could you picture a 42-year-old Joey Votto as a Kyle Schwarber-type long-ball specialist? Votto could!<\/p>\n
\u201cThe only thing that gets me,\u201d he began, \u201cis \u2026 when I was 37 or 38, I hit a lot of home runs. I hit like 36 homers (in 2021). And I did that in 120 games or 130 games or something. And I thought I found something.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd I have felt physically quite well (recently), as far as feeling strong and feeling like I have good grip strength and good rotational. And I just thought it\u2019s a bit of a bummer that I didn\u2019t stay healthy enough that I could have just had this stretch of time in my career, where all I did was just try to hit homers. And it would have come pretty naturally to me.\u201d<\/p>\n
Pause for a moment here to imagine this man working counts and pumping 40 majestic bombs a year into the Great American Ball Park seats. Could that have been him? Why not? There\u2019s another longtime NL Central star who had a final act just like that. Votto recalls it well.<\/p>\n
\u201cSo I think that\u2019s the only bummer thing,\u201d he said, \u201cbecause when you see Albert Pujols hit his 700th home run when he\u2019s like 43 years old, 42 years old, you think to yourself: That would have been cool, tacking on another two or three years \u2026 because he was doing it basically as I sit here right now. And I\u2019m 42 now.<\/p>\n
\u201cSo no, I don\u2019t dream about it. I don\u2019t miss the sport \u2014 because of just how challenging it was and how much it asked of me. But I was, for sure, thankful to have the opportunity to play until the wheels fell off.\u201d<\/p>\n
Oh, there was much more. So much more. We urge you to find this show on YouTube<\/a> or wherever you get your podcasts<\/a>. If you do, you\u2019ll learn all about \u2026<\/p>\n \u2022 The life lesson he wishes people had warned him about when he retired.<\/p>\n \u2022 How he thinks ABS would have changed a major feature of his offensive game \u2014 and the ABS bombshell that\u2019s lurking in this postseason.<\/p>\n \u2022 Where he was last October, as a famous resident of Toronto, as the Blue Jays were firing up all of Canada and roaring into the World Series.<\/p>\n \u2022 The young player he thinks is as great, at his position, as there \u201chas ever been in the history of the sport.\u201d<\/p>\n \u2022 How he views the\u00a0take-that\u00a0season of Bryce Harper \u2014 and the hurdles Harper still has to conquer.<\/p>\n \u2022 What he gleaned, from his travels, about how the effort and dedication of everyday people differ from the effort and dedication of baseball players.<\/p>\n \u2022 The must-see event he\u2019d stage after\u00a0the World Series that would rock the baseball earth.<\/p>\n \u2022 What he\u2019ll be doing as a member of NBC\u2019s new Sunday Night Baseball team \u2014 and how he\u2019d like to do that job.<\/p>\n \u2022 And what \u201cthe older generation\u201d gets wrong about baseball in 2026: \u201cThe thing that I do the most now is try to understand what I understand and what I don\u2019t understand.\u201d<\/p>\n I\u2019ll sum it all up like this: I\u2019ve been having conversations with baseball players for many years now, but I\u2019ve never had one quite like this.<\/p>\n So join us in Starkville. Visitors are always welcome.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"He earned his official sushi chef accreditation from the government of Japan. He\u2019s now a certified yoga instructor…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":689966,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[558],"tags":[64,63,5257,591,85],"class_list":["post-689965","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mlb","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-cincinnati-reds","tag-mlb","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/689965","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=689965"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/689965\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/689966"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=689965"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=689965"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=689965"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}