Isn’t the simple answer money? Ohtani could have been paying him a lot of money to be the middleman.
I’m not necessarily saying I believe that, but it seems that it’s an easy benefit for Mizuhara.
Shohei Ohtani’s attorneys accuse interpreter of ‘massive theft’ tied to alleged gambling
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I’m not necessarily saying I believe that, but it seems that it’s an easy benefit for Mizuhara.
It's pretty far down the list of unfortunate things in this whole saga but one thing I keep thinking about is that Ippei was basically the best actual translator any of these guys has ever had.
Either Ohtani and Mizuhara were running a years-long gambling conspiracy in which they absolutely never slipped up and documented it anywhere, even accidentally, a single time -- which included Mizuhara being recorded by the bank impersonating Ohtani so poorly over the phone that it ended up freezing the account -- and which now involves the FBI covering up for him,
or Mizuhara was simply stealing from him.
I mean come on. He even confessed to the bookie who was being monitored by the FBI and who was replying with texts practically begging him to stop incriminating himself. It's almost more believable that this is all a comedy screenplay he's pitching Hollywood
edit: not just the FBI (who searched the bookie's phone), but also the IRS, who is responsible for the indictment
This is where I am. My skepticism of the story ended when I read the FBI had recordings of Mizuhara calling the bank pretending to be Ohtani.Either Ohtani and Mizuhara were running a years-long gambling conspiracy in which they absolutely never slipped up and documented it anywhere, even accidentally, a single time -- which included Mizuhara being recorded by the bank impersonating Ohtani so poorly over the phone that it ended up freezing the account -- and which now involves the FBI covering up for him,
or Mizuhara was simply stealing from him.
I mean come on. He even confessed to the bookie who was being monitored by the FBI and who was replying with texts practically begging him to stop incriminating himself. It's almost more believable that this is all a comedy screenplay he's pitching Hollywood
edit: not just the FBI (who searched the bookie's phone), but also the IRS, who is responsible for the indictment
Or worse yet, Wells Fargo was involved.
On a side note, I don't know of any Japanese people here that only have one phone. My guess though (and it's just a guess) that someone investigating this has looked into what phone carriers he's using.
"Technically, I did steal from him" is kind of a weird thing to say, right? Using "technically" sort of implies that he didn't really steal, but only "technically". It's an odd statement, and maybe he just used an odd word. It just doesn't make a lot of sense.
How are we all feeling about these takes now? I'm not looking for internet points, and the whole saga isn't yet put to bed so maybe more details could come out that do incriminate Ohtani, though that seems unlikely now. I'm just flagging them in the hopes that maybe in the future we won't be so quick to jump to conclusions when perfectly plausible alternative explanations exist.
Because I've basically believed Shohei at every step along the way, the bolded has been the only part that's been bothering me the whole time. So apparently they did try to get access to various accounts but were repeatedly stonewalled/rebuffed by Ippei. I completely agree that it's borderline malpractice on the part of Ohtani's agent(s), and I hope process reviews are underway.Companies like CAA provide financial services for their high-profile clients because it is in their interest to protect the client. Almost as if he/she is their child.
It’s not unusual for clients to say “No, I’ll handle that myself.” It’s incredibly unusual, bordering on malpractice, for a client to be surrounded by a team of advisors who accept that an interpreter is acting as the de facto CFO of all things Ohtani because no one understands Japanese. And yet, we appear to be here.
It’s truly astonishing.
My wild-ass guess about the CAA angle is that not having an in-house Japanese speaker is likely to be a function of the hierarchy within the agency not wanting to give up their extremely profitable/high profile Japanese clientele to a new hire. Ohtani's team there is either going to be the most senior people or the individual agent who landed him; either way they're going to be guarding their role and having a native speaker on staff would jeopardize that.
I guess Mizuhara is probably really that dumb, but the conspiracy nut in me just thinks this looks way too conveniently like a try hard effort to get it established that this was all Mizuhara.
I mean he knew at this time that the Bookie was under investigation and that text would be discovered. But it was probably too soon for him to be working with police/FBI against the bookie. So he had either realized he was toast and given up, he was acting as a "fall guy" and wanted to get it on the record that it was all him, or he's a complete moron.
As much as I love Ohtani and want this all to be someone else's fault, I'm really leaning toward "B". I would be thrilled to be proven wrong, but none of us really knows anything yet. We're all just speculating.
This sort of discovery is always interesting. Are the persons communicating actually aware their texts might be subsequently discovered by law-enforcement, or do they consider their phones might be tapped? Rather surprisingly, the answer is often "no." When they do, communications often begin to assume a stage-whisper tone. But even at that point, it's never wise to assume that stage-whisper is carefully planned, or based off a solid understanding of the situation or what will actually matter at the end of the day. People say all kinds of weird shit to attempt to steer impressions - and a lot of it is just not legally relevant.
Generally though, it's fair to assume the best/clearest stuff goes into the affidavit of this nature, so here, it's interesting that the investigator chose to include a text where the bookie seems to suggest Ohtani knew something or was gambling - "Obviously you didn't steal from him." "I understand it's a cover job."
The question becomes, what exactly did the bookie think was going on, and why? The prosecution is under no obligation to answer that question in the affidavit, BTW, and there may well be an answer.
For example, I would be surprised if that was the only text exchange between Mizuhara and the bookie for that month, or on that topic. So there may be other communications that shed more light on things.
Maybe I'm misunderstanding your post, but why would the Japanese speaker need to be an agent? Why couldn't the current agents simply hire their own interpreter to sit in on meetings etc. Then if any red flags or concerns arise, they could go back to Ohtani with their own interpreter and say "Ippei told us XYZ (e.g. you want only him to have access to your accounts), we just want to confirm that's what you meant to say".
Because Ippei was also Ohtani's best friend and from a client relations perspective, double checking his work is a risk. And meetings with Ohtani aren't going to be open to everyone in the office; it's not like you can just sneak someone in there unnoticed.
FWIW, IMO the most salient "facts" (from the affidavit) that go towards Ohtani's innocence/non-involvement would be:
-Gambling winnings go to Mizuhara's account, not back to Ohtani's.
-Payments for losses come out of Ohtani's account.
-Mizuhara purchased baseball cards for himself with money out of Ohtani's account.
-Mizuhara impersonated Ohtani to clear wires at the bank.
Others are potentially huge, but not really nailed down in the aff:
-Ohtani's non-access of the account.
Many others are more neutral/unknown. For example, Mizuhara apparently used Signal to communicate with the Bookie, so had some idea of communication discipline. If so, non-texting with Ohtani isn't really that probative. Likewise, the idea that Mizuhara had gambled before only gains weight if it was unusual, while the Aff is silent as to Ohtani's prior gambling (if any.)
Overall, the aff paints a picture of Ohtani being comprehensively duped. Is it a complete picture? No. Is this partial picture a likely picture? Well, perhaps not very likely, but as I said, Mizuhara running rings around everyone would absolutely not be the weirdest/stupidest thing I have seen - by a longshot.
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However, as a somewhat separate matter from our social judgements, there's absolutely enough gray space here for any non-brain-dead defense attorney to tell Mizuhara not to plead guilty until some questions are answered. Maybe Mizuhara has counsel - maybe he does not. Maybe those questions have already been answered to his counsel's satisfaction. Maybe the deal is fantastically good. (We just don't know yet.)
When looking at things in this bucket, you have to keep in mind the prosecution has to prove the case beyond a reasonable doubt. So this might be a situation where there's enough evidence to convince a jury that it's way more likely than not, that Mizuhara did this all on his own, but not enough to criminally convict him. Or to say it another way, something showing that Ohtani knew, or possibly knew, would be significant. Even if that something wouldn't be enough on its own to make a case against Ohtani himself.
That's more of a background/precautionary thought on my part, since it looks like Mizuhara is going to plead guilty.
But if he changes his plea, I don't think anybody's current opinion needs to wildly change.
Just a guess, but if I am a bookie I would be pretty reluctant to keep extending the guy credit if I thought he was stealing the money. I guess at those numbers, I would also be surprised if the bookie thought Mizuhara was stealing from Ohtani, because it would be hard to believe a guy could get away with it for so long.
Then again, there was another text where the bookie tells Mizuhara that he couldn’t keep floating him and that he had seen Ohtani walking somewhere and was going to have a conversation with him if Mizuhara did not pay.
Given people have used prison phones to talk about the illegal shit they did, Mizuhara sending that text while knowing the bookie was under investigation isn't very far out there.
Mizuhara could easily have been lying to everybody. Thus, I read the texts as most likely meaning the bookie believed that Mizuhara was placing bets on behalf of Ohtani. The money coming to the bookie from Ohtani's account would give the bookie a plausible reason to believe Mizuhara was placing the bets on behalf of Ohtani. It also fits with the bookie having bragged about Ohtani being a client.
Using "technically" doesn't register to me as much of a tell that Ohtani was secretly involved and this is all a cover-up. It reads to me as Mizuhara making an "oopsie" face and admitting he was lying to the bookie the whole time.
It also just seems so unlikely that the FBI/IRS would bother covering for Ohtani if they thought he'd really been the one placing bets. Why? What do they care? Why wouldn't they want to nail him for lying to them about Mizuhara's role instead? He'd be a big feather in someone's cap, no?
Mizuhara could easily have been lying to everybody. Thus, I read the texts as most likely meaning the bookie believed that Mizuhara was placing bets on behalf of Ohtani. The money coming to the bookie from Ohtani's account would give the bookie a plausible reason to believe Mizuhara was placing the bets on behalf of Ohtani. It also fits with the bookie having bragged about Ohtani being a client.
Using "technically" doesn't register to me as much of a tell that Ohtani was secretly involved and this is all a cover-up. It reads to me as Mizuhara making an "oopsie" face and admitting he was lying to the bookie the whole time.
It also just seems so unlikely that the FBI/IRS would bother covering for Ohtani if they thought he'd really been the one placing bets. Why? What do they care? Why wouldn't they want to nail him for lying to them about Mizuhara's role instead? He'd be a big feather in someone's cap, no?
One of the issues with interpreters is often their knowledge of technical/legal/financial terms and the greater concepts behind them. For example, the basic role of a judge can be very different between countries, and compliance and standard practice in one place is not the same as another. I personally won't use an interpreter who isn't well-versed in whatever particular matters are relevant, both in English and [whatever]. Not everyone is as scrupulous. (But I assure you my budget is way smaller than Ohtani's agent's.)
Pure speculation on my part here, but I somehow doubt that Mizuhara had the sort of background to accurately interpret the subjects at hand. And generally, if that were true, I'd expect the US agent to tweak to the fact that some of the answers/responses coming back didn't exactly track.
Point being, you don't need to run two interpreters in the same room.
This changes nothing. Why did Ohtani change his story in the beginning? $16 million goes missing from his bank account and Ohtani didn’t notice. Bullshit. The whole thing stinks.
Generally agreed on all points.
The "going to ask Ohtani how to get in touch with you" text could be read several different ways. It establishes the bookie clearly knew who Mizuhara was, and therefore knew where he worked and lived and could be found. And the bookie clearly already had Mizuhara's phone number and personal bank information. The wires came from Ohtani's account and had Ohtani's name on them IIRC.
So I doubt it's literal, so much as an attempt to apply pressure to get payment. But what kind of pressure?
- It could be a threat to expose Mizuhara's gambling to Ohtani.
- It could be a threat to "pierce the veil" and now-involve Ohtani directly (assuming the bookie thought Mizuhara was Ohtani's catspaw.)
I'd lean toward the second. Assuming Mizuhara convinced the bookie he was independently wealthy, what would going to Ohtani get the bookie? If Mizuhara were stealing, it is a credible threat, as that would shut off the money flowing to the agent?
Conversely, assuming Mizuhara was funded by, or the agent of Ohtani, threatening to upset any kind of tacitly understood arrangement creates pressure.
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Interesting. Had not thought of the second angle. And your bigger point — that the other 980 “pages” of texts might help us understand — is a good one. We only see what they want us to see.
Ohtani didn't change his story, Ippei did. Ippei was speaking for Ohtani the whole time.
I have been somewhat skeptical of the “Ohtani is completely innocent” perspective (sorry, @Tokyo Sox) from the outset.
That said, I do wonder if the reason for the first story—he’s my friend and I was paying his gambling debts—was that they thought the extent of the theft was kind of manageable and Mizuhara was, in fact, Ohtani’s friend. But once it became clear that this guy had stolen $16M, had been impersonating Ohtani on calls with the bank and was, all told, in debt for $40M, it was probably game over for Mizuhara and his people told him “You need to cut him loose.”
To me, that’s a narrative I could buy and does seem consistent with the facts the prosecutors have laid out.
I would absolutely believe that $16 million would disappear and Ohtani wouldn't notice. He's notoriously focused on baseball. He has multiple accounts with more than $16 million in it. He makes $55-60 million in endorsements a year. He's got money coming in all over the place. And he wants to concentrate on baseball.
And he doesn't speak the language. He trusted Ippei to run everything.
Yes. Ohtani's current stance is 100% consistent - that doesn't necessarily make it true. But Ippei told Ohtani's team and ESPN that Ohtani was helping him out, then said actually Ippei stole from Ohtani, then made an announcement in the Dodgers clubhouse, which is when Ohtani found out what had been happening.
Again - this isn't necessarily TRUE, but it's a consistent story.
The Athletic has a solid breakdown of how things happened (sorry if this was posted previously; I didn't see it)
https://theathletic.com/5409393/2024/04/11/shohei-ohtani-interpreter-affidavit-takeaways/
https://theathletic.com/5409393/2024/04/11/shohei-ohtani-interpreter-affidavit-takeaways/
I wouldn't be surprised if every agent/agency with non-English speaking clients is currently reviewing their policies. I get that there are some delicate client relations issues involved. But there's got to be a way an agency can use their own bilingual person, without it seeming like " we don't trust your interpreter, so here's our own", which is maybe how my last post came across.
I don't know what the solution is, but this whole scenario shows how dangerous it can be for one person (Ippei) to have such power, with no checks or balances in place. Of course, Ohtani did trust him implicitly, and that apparently worked out for the first few years. Unfortunately, Ohtani is not the first person to be fleeced by someone he trusted (at this point I believe that's what happened), and he won't be the last.
I don't know what the solution is, but this whole scenario shows how dangerous it can be for one person (Ippei) to have such power, with no checks or balances in place. Of course, Ohtani did trust him implicitly, and that apparently worked out for the first few years. Unfortunately, Ohtani is not the first person to be fleeced by someone he trusted (at this point I believe that's what happened), and he won't be the last.
There's probably long-established methods for Spanish speaking players, because there are so many more of them. You're probably also more likely to have agents on staff who speak Spanish.
Yeah, I was kind of thinking the same thing. But given the increasing number of Japanese, and other Asian players, coming to MLB, it's probably something they should be prepared for.
Everyone keeps on wondering why someone didn't notice 16m disappearing like it happened all in one huge withdrawal. Ohtani losing a few hundred thousand a week or month or whatever is probably like me noticing someone took bought a meal at Chipotle with my credit card fraudulently...which is to say possibly unlikely.
And the interpreter using Signal to do the messaging is hardly any sort of inner look into his knowledge of keeping things on the down low...it's almost a certainty that the bookie asked him to see that app rather than him saying "oh I want to make sure this is private."
Also why would a bookie NOT extend credit to someone who has been proven to be able to pay off his previous debts? I think the bookie knew for sure that this was an acquaintance of Ohtani and possibly (if not likely) thought he was a cover guy. Right now all the evidence that links Ohtani for any of this is money being taken from his account and moved to the bookie. So this genius criminal enterprise is smart enough to make sure Ohtani is protected by not having any winnings deposited to his bank account and to not have any phone records...oh but we will conveniently forget to cover the most important part which is where the money comes from.
I mean seriously...people are now looking at the word "technically" and hunting for reasons now to try and fil in blanks to say that Ohtani had knowledge of things and that this is a federal coverup. What are we doing here?
And the interpreter using Signal to do the messaging is hardly any sort of inner look into his knowledge of keeping things on the down low...it's almost a certainty that the bookie asked him to see that app rather than him saying "oh I want to make sure this is private."
Also why would a bookie NOT extend credit to someone who has been proven to be able to pay off his previous debts? I think the bookie knew for sure that this was an acquaintance of Ohtani and possibly (if not likely) thought he was a cover guy. Right now all the evidence that links Ohtani for any of this is money being taken from his account and moved to the bookie. So this genius criminal enterprise is smart enough to make sure Ohtani is protected by not having any winnings deposited to his bank account and to not have any phone records...oh but we will conveniently forget to cover the most important part which is where the money comes from.
I mean seriously...people are now looking at the word "technically" and hunting for reasons now to try and fil in blanks to say that Ohtani had knowledge of things and that this is a federal coverup. What are we doing here?
That theory does not really mesh with the allegations in the aff though. That being:
Mizuhara carefully sequestered an account with the entirety of his employer's MLB salary for 5 years and stole from it for the last 2.5 years. He was never (ever) supposed to have access to the account, and had no authority to invest it or make bets with it or whathaveyou.
For a lot of people that's just hard to square. Ohtani, while having a private life, cares enough about his endorsement income to have his US agent oversee it with a team of professionals. He cares cares enough about that promotional/endorsement stuff to actually do it - to film the commercials, make the appearances, keep the Ohtani brand up. He does not really come across as a kind of Manny-esque idiot-savant.
That's a needle that can be threaded of course, but not easily or intuitively, and so, the disconnect. Mizuhara had to be a deep planner to entirely screen off that account from oversight back in 2019, all the while looking ahead to 2021?
Analogies can be useful, but this isn't one which is.
We're talking about the entirety of 5 years of his MLB salary going into a single account. Which is about $40M pre-tax and perhaps $20M final deposited cash? (Estimates vary.) Granted, most of that $30M came in 2023.
The investment and accounting team, despite being aware of the account, was allegedly verbally told by Mizuhara that the money was just sitting there. It hadn't been invested, wasn't making any interest in it's special null account, wasn't gifted in any way, shouldn't be looked at, and Ohtani, who was interested in investing his endorsement money via his agent and getting reports on how things were going, was absolutely not interested in investing this money. It was just there, never to be touched. And apparently not used for anything else the investment team would have been involved in like acquiring large assets - because they could see where spending for any of that sort of thing came from.
Ohtani, meanwhile, wasn't interested in the particulars of each account, and somehow managed (via Mizuhara) to convey. . .something that indicated he wanted his investments to do well, but that $20M was in a black box. A perfectly legal on the up-and-up black box. Because that's what people do who are also shooting commercials to earn money.
The hardest thing about this to believe is that when Ohtani was just getting going in '18 and '19 and '20, Mizuhara had already laid the groundwork for this with the investment team.
Oh - and per the aff, this is apparently all verbal interview stuff from the team. No emails, or the like.
The point is not to decide what the final situation is. . .the point is to weigh the facts (assuming they're true) that we know. There are other ways of framing the above facts, but when you ask why someone would wonder - that's why.
Am I reading this right that he made bets that totaled $324M?? That's more than the payroll of any team in baseball. His losing bets were more than the payrolls of 19 teams in baseball.
You win some and you fucking lose some, eh?
When I first signed up for sportsbooks, I did a lot of promo harvesting and stuff, and so I was placing a fair number of bets. I was a little bit shocked when I looked at the final totals that the sports books posted for what I had wagered. I was just thinking in terms of overall up or down, and the actual amount of bets was a lot of money. On draft kings I was like "I'm up $2,000!" But when I saw the win loss totals (which I needed for taxes) I was pretty floored. Never felt close to that.
It's kind of like going to the blackjack table. If you sit down with $500 and make $25 bets, you're really only focused on your balance. You may walk away after two hours up $50 but having wagered $7,500.
Which is just me making a silly observation in a case where we're talking about a third of a billion dollars bet! The guy was taking heavy action, obviously, but the numbers get a bit distorted from how it feels day to day.
Do people think that Ohtani made $180300+M in bets without there being any electronic evidence that it came from him? I mean no texts about potential results; no texts or conversations with other people about what bets to make, etc.?
Seems like he'd have to be a criminal mastermind to be that level of a gambler but no one can find anything that connects him to the bets.
Seems like he'd have to be a criminal mastermind to be that level of a gambler but no one can find anything that connects him to the bets.
Yup. People only care about the net gain or loss and doing $25k/day means you wagered $9M / year. And if you get on a winning streak, that $25K / day probably increases. Speaking from experience, there is a whole lot of churn associated with sports betting. I’m risk averse so my whole strategy is avoid big losses but I have friends who are far more aggressive and they have huge swings in their betting results.
A good point, and perhaps also a true one.
However, this is the negative screening for Ohtani:
They don't have to frame it in any particular way, but this does not mean there was information that was relevant to sports betting at all. Personally, if there was no discussion of sports betting at all, or the results of games, I'd have put that in there, a bit more clearly than "c." does. Assuming I wanted the aff to carry water for Ohtani, which the aff clearly does.
Also, this isn't technically an either/or thing.
No accountant ever said "We're doing your tax returns, we need the interest income from your MLB salary savings account"? Would his financial advisors really 'allow' him to have $40 million in a non-interest account?
They did ask. It’s in the affidavit. Ippei said it was in a non interest bearing account, and Ohtani wanted it private.
Second question. 40 million in a non interest earning account? I guess they asked Ippei, I guess but they should have pressed more.
At the very least, his agent should have had direct contacts to Ohtani’s Japanese agents/financial advisors just for coordination purposes, or even just friendly ties with his parents as a last resort.
Yes, people think that. I'm not sure why at this point, but they do.
If there was no discussion of sports betting, you'd have put it more clearly than, "did not contain any messages that discussed sports betting"?
Yeah, as due to the "or" paring, there's an elided/implied possessive, "Mizuhara's sports betting or gambling debts." Better to let it stand alone by itself without any ambiguity or linkage. Much more powerful that way.
There is one thing I want to get off my chest as I sat here wondering why I even give two shits about this.
And I want to make sure I'm as clear as I can be with this and I'm not outwardly accusing anyone of consciously doing this out of any sort of malice.
Here it is. Some of you may know that I'm an Asian American. I, luckily, have not appeared to suffer from too much psychological damage growing up in New England in the 80s and being subject to all the stereotypes we have...especially since I met most of them.
But I want to pose a question. If this happened to an American American or Latin American or any race, would people be conjuring up dramatic cases of criminal mastery?
Which brings me to this. Does anyone know if Ohtani is more like Greg Maddix or Jonathan Papelbon? Like...are people putting on this idea that Ohtani, because he's seemingly been built in a factory and bred for baseball, is apparently a genius with hiding his multimillion gambling habit?
I'm saying the above not as me accusing anyone at all, but more an explanation to others on why this random guy who almost never posts in the MLB forums seems to incredulous at many of the posts.
I have a feeling someone will take what I said the wrong way, and my next words may just be me trying to cover my ass. But I truly mean this...I have never once stood up for myself for race related things, so I'm certainly not too sensitive about it...but for some random reason, this did and maybe someone can explained exactly why be sure I'm not sure I do.
Editorial addition: I'm not sure I will post about this anymore because I don't want to defend myself nor attack anyone about this. I just want people to think a little bit harder about why they think that Ohtani did something criminal...and this coming from someone who still thinks something else has to drop, but not necessarily on Ohtani himself.
And I want to make sure I'm as clear as I can be with this and I'm not outwardly accusing anyone of consciously doing this out of any sort of malice.
Here it is. Some of you may know that I'm an Asian American. I, luckily, have not appeared to suffer from too much psychological damage growing up in New England in the 80s and being subject to all the stereotypes we have...especially since I met most of them.
But I want to pose a question. If this happened to an American American or Latin American or any race, would people be conjuring up dramatic cases of criminal mastery?
Which brings me to this. Does anyone know if Ohtani is more like Greg Maddix or Jonathan Papelbon? Like...are people putting on this idea that Ohtani, because he's seemingly been built in a factory and bred for baseball, is apparently a genius with hiding his multimillion gambling habit?
I'm saying the above not as me accusing anyone at all, but more an explanation to others on why this random guy who almost never posts in the MLB forums seems to incredulous at many of the posts.
I have a feeling someone will take what I said the wrong way, and my next words may just be me trying to cover my ass. But I truly mean this...I have never once stood up for myself for race related things, so I'm certainly not too sensitive about it...but for some random reason, this did and maybe someone can explained exactly why be sure I'm not sure I do.
Editorial addition: I'm not sure I will post about this anymore because I don't want to defend myself nor attack anyone about this. I just want people to think a little bit harder about why they think that Ohtani did something criminal...and this coming from someone who still thinks something else has to drop, but not necessarily on Ohtani himself.
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