My post last night took a bit of a shot at Shohei Ohtani‘s use of the word “shocked” in his press conference. If you read the original article, Ohtani (or his new interpreter) used the word three times.

The scene in Casablanca is iconic. I, in fact, don’t believe that I’ve used the word “shocked” to express actual shock. I always use it sarcastically, like, “I’m shocked that a politician would take a bribe!”

So Ohtani uses this word of multiple connotations, and actually uses in the original context of gambling! He suggests a famous movie line in a city all about film.

Where were his PR people? Ohtani didn’t take questions, so this talk should have been written and rehearsed. (Again, he’s in the movie capital of the world.) Someone, during the rehersal, should have said, “Don’t use the word ‘shocked’.”

This was sloppy. Ohtani usually handles the press well. This winter We saw him manipulate the coverage of his free agency, generate publicity for himself by withholding the name of his dog, and build interest with a marriage that is teased before being revealed in full.

As the LA Times notes, the image Ohtani tries to project is someone consumed by baseball, so consumed that nothing else matters:

Believing Ohtani’s story about Mizuhara requires one to believe that Ohtani is who he portrays himself to be, an overgrown yakyu shonen — a boy who lives, eats and breathes baseball — with almost no other interests. His rumored apathy for money could explain how he failed to notice that Mizuhara had stolen millions of dollars from him.

…

On the other hand, Ohtani is almost 30 years old. He was one of the top students in his high school class, according to Sasaki, and his intelligence is apparent in his quick wit and strong diction. Can someone with his mental capacity live a life of just baseball, baseball, baseball? His recent marriage already showed there was more to him than his profession.

MSN.com

The big question comes down to why would someone so meticulous is everything we do see about him be less meticulous in other important aspects of life?

As a side question, Ohtani flashes a quick wit with strong diction? In English? It must be English, right? If it were translated wit, why mention the diction?

I suspect Ohtani understands English a bit better than we are led to believe. Part of this story is that the translator mislead Ohtani during the Dodgers team meeting. My question would be, “What did you think you heard, and how different was that from what the translator told you?” I do understand that hearing a language is very different from reading or speaking it. I’m just wondering if the translations in this seemed more misunderstood from Ohtani’s point of view, if Ohtani thought he was making more recognition errors than usual. That might have been a red flag to the player.

I am taking a wait and see attitude about this scandal. The news media, MLB, and law enforcement are all looking into this. We’ll get many different opinions, and with luck a clearer picture of what went on.