Shohei Otani: The Next Revolution

Shohei Otani has been the talk of baseball for the last 5 months. Everyone around the game knows and follows his every movement, curiosity surrounds him. The Japanese import is something that hasn’t been seen since the early days of baseball, he pitches and hits. No one in has done that professionally since Babe Ruth did with the Red Sox in the 1910’s. Ruth pitched for the Red Sox and developed his worldwide known power while guiding them to multiple World Series wins until he was traded to the New York Yankees for $125,000. Otani when he was coming through the Japanese professional system gathered comparisons to the Bambino, as he has electric pitches and top tier power. Scouts from every team looked at him and wondered if he could produce doing both in the Major Leagues, and people still wondered how he and the Los Angeles Angels would handle his unique talent when he was signed.

Every baseball player who has played throughout their lives has pitched and the same goes for hitting as well. But as players get older and develop they become specialized and stay on either the offensive side or pitching side of the game. This is because of the intense work it takes to reach the highest potential they can. Some players really don’t specialize until they reach college but even then you can see two way players go through college. A. J. Reed played first base for the University of Kentucky but when he was drafted by the Houston Astros became a first baseman only. These cases are plenty when you go back through history and that is what make Otani special. He has been amazing so far into the season and has given me no inclination of why the success should stop.

Otani, after struggling earlier in Spring Training, has opened up the season in outstanding fashion hitting at a .342 clip with 3 homeruns and on the mound he holds a 2-1 record with a 3.60 earned run average but more importantly a WHIP (Walks and Hits per Innings Pitched) of 0.80. That means that he is allows less than one baserunner an inning which is amazing. Some people are waiting to see how the league adjusts to him but if you watch him pitch it is amazing. His pitches all have exceptional movement and great spot up control and he demonstrates great poise on the mound. Scouts who have watched him extensively noted that when he doesn’t have good feel for his fastball and his splitter, his two best pitches that he struggles making adjustments in game which cause him to struggle mightily. This happened in his last start against the Red Sox but I feel with more work and experience he should be fine in that aspect. Overall I feel that Otani will only get better as he acclimates himself to the American game and the sky is the limit for him.