Shohei Ohtani is amazing.<\/p>\n
For years, I refused to see the light. I didn\u2019t care that he hit and he pitched. I thought that his value was diminished because he didn\u2019t play in the field four out of every five games. Wrongly, I believed he should be docked points, or value, or acclaim, because he didn\u2019t play, say, left field every single game as opposed to taking the mound once or twice per week.<\/p>\n
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But now I\u2019m ready to admit it: Shohei Ohtani is the best baseball player of my lifetime.<\/p>\n
Regardless of seeing the light, it still pains me to say that. I\u2019ve never rooted for a team for which Ohtani\u2019s played. Currently, I\u2019m hoping for the Blue Jays to take down his Dodgers in the World Series. I\u2019ve never liked the Dodgers, and I\u2019ve certainly never cared for the Angels. The Angels are one of those few teams I rarely think about, and they\u2019ve been like that for years, even when they featured three of the most prominent baseball players of the era: Ohtani, Mike Trout, and Albert Pujols.<\/p>\n
To have played years for a team toward whom I\u2019m apathetic, and years more for a team I despise, and yet to be considered the top player of my lifetime? My man, you are incredible.<\/p>\n
Ohtani should win his third straight MVP this season\u2014the first one in the American League in his last year with the Angels, last year and this with the Dodgers. During those years, he\u2019s slashed .298\/.397\/.640. Ho hum, that\u2019s just an OPS 84% above league average. He\u2019s hit 153 home runs while scoring 382 runs and driving in another 327. He\u2019s added an additional 113 extra-base hits.<\/p>\n
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On the mound, he\u2019s twice come back from huge injuries to pitch well. He didn\u2019t pitch at all in 2019 and then only twice in 2020. Then, in 2021, he goes 9-2 over 21 starts with a 141 ERA+ with a 3.52 FIP\u2014while winning his first MVP award as he hit 46 homers, drove in 100, and scored 103 runs as he posted a .257\/.372\/.592 slash line.<\/p>\n
In 2022, while finishing second in MVP voting, he finishes fourth in the Cy Young. That\u2019s unheard of! Not even Babe Ruth did that. No one\u2019s done that! These are baseball heights heretofore unseen.<\/p>\n
Again, he injures his elbow, and while he rehabs to get back on the mound, he crushes it in the batter\u2019s box. He finally returned to pitching again this season, and in 47 innings, goes 1-1 with a 1.90 FIP, 1.043 WHIP, and struck out damn near 12 batters per nine innings.<\/p>\n
Yes, I think it\u2019s safe to say that Shohei Ohtani is the best player to take to the diamond in the past 10 years, 20 years, 30 years, 40 years, since the dawn of time, if you wanted to go back that far.<\/p>\n
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With him starring in the World Series, and his team finding itself on the brink of elimination at the time of this writing on the morning of Halloween, this Royals Review writer wanted to give Ohtani\u2014who also won the NLCS MVP last season, and should win the World Series MVP this year if the Dodgers rally back, and who also reached base in all nine of his plate appearances in Game 3\u2014his flowers.<\/p>\n
The dude\u2019s the best.<\/p>\n
Here are my top 10 baseball players of my lifetime with Ohtani taking honors. First, a few who just missed, in alphabetical order.<\/p>\n
Just Missed:<\/p>\n
Adrian Beltre<\/p>\n
Miguel Cabrera<\/p>\n
Tony Gwynn<\/p>\n
Omar Infante<\/p>\n
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Aaron Judge<\/p>\n
Clayton Kershaw<\/p>\n
Pedro Martinez<\/p>\n
Julio Rodriguez<\/p>\n
Juan Soto<\/p>\n
Justin Verlander<\/p>\n
Top 10 Players of My Lifetime<\/p>\n
10. Bobby Witt Jr.\u2014Ma\u2019am, this is a Kansas City Royals blogsite.<\/p>\n
9. Alex Rodriguez\u2014I\u2019m sure everyone is cool with A-Rod being on this list. Mr. Rodriguez, please fix the Timberwolves. They are not playing well.<\/p>\n
8. Roger Clemens\u2014HE SHOULD BE IN THE HALL OF FAME THANK YOU FOR YOUR ATTENTION TO THIS MATTER.<\/p>\n
7. Ichiro Suzuki\u2014All-time hits leader.<\/p>\n
6. Mike Trout\u2014Would probably be No. 1 if not for injuries. 96 homers away from 500. Not sure he\u2019ll reach it.<\/p>\n
5. Albert Pujols\u2014Greatest right-handed hitter in the history of baseball. Maple Woods alum.<\/p>\n
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4. Randy Johnson\u2014Lots of inner dialogue on whether he was the best pitcher I\u2019ve ever seen. Comes up just short. Hell of a photographer.<\/p>\n
3. Greg Maddux<\/p>\n
2. Barry Bonds\u2014Another crowd pleaser, I\u2019m sure.<\/p>\n
1. Shohei Ohtani<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Shohei Ohtani is amazing. For years, I refused to see the light. I didn\u2019t care that he hit…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":271430,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[65],"tags":[4260,145204,42610,12306,67870,145202,9307,4279,19203,7842,48328,29502,2321,115095,105614,363,145205,79994,3956,99,57682,145203],"class_list":["post-271429","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mlb","tag-aaron-judge","tag-adrian-beltre","tag-albert-pujols","tag-alex-rodriguez","tag-baseball-player","tag-baseball-players","tag-clayton-kershaw","tag-dodgers","tag-ichiro-suzuki","tag-juan-soto","tag-julio-rodriguez","tag-justin-verlander","tag-kansas-city-royals","tag-miguel-cabrera","tag-mike-trout","tag-mlb","tag-omar-infante","tag-pedro-martinez","tag-shohei-ohtani","tag-sports","tag-the-angels","tag-world-series-mvp"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/271429","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=271429"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/271429\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/271430"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=271429"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=271429"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=271429"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}