How Shohei Ohtani's 'mystique' is transforming the Dodgers' future
LOS ANGELES — You got him.
That was the message that Shohei Ohtani's agent, Nez Balelo, delivered to the Dodgers' president of baseball operations, Andrew Friedman, right around noon Pacific time on Dec. 9.
Three little words to end one of the biggest free-agent sagas in recent baseball history.
Three magic words likely to shape the next chapter of the Dodgers' storied history.
For years, the Dodgers had dreamed of signing Ohtani, baseball's first two-way star in roughly a century. For months this winter, they strategized ways to woo the two-time American League MVP to Chavez Ravine.
It all reached a head in early December, when a wave of online speculation and incorrect media reports — most of them centered on a private jet flight to Toronto — tested the Dodgers' confidence, turning thoughts of missing out on Ohtani into a seemingly legitimate possibility.
"It was like watching election returns," team president Stan Kasten recalled. "You really don't have any inside information, so you're just sitting at home watching on TV, following on Twitter
