Current Events > Shohei Ohtani's interpreter fired by Dodgers for Theft relating to gambling

(+) Yeah! (+)

https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2024-03-20/gambling-story

Something smells hella fishy, like he's taking a fall.

Imagine fumbling that bag

IF its true

Ohtani def caught gambling they are blaming the interpreter cuz the golden boy getting caught would destroy the league

CADE_FOSTER posted...

Ohtani def caught gambling they are blaming the interpreter cuz the golden boy getting caught would destroy the league

Imagine the absolute chaos if legalizing gambling ads immediately led to the biggest gambling scandal since the 1919 White Sox.

No coming back from it

Mizuhara told ESPN he met Bowyer at a San Diego poker game in 2021 and started betting with him on credit later that year. He estimated his losses mounted to more than $1 million by the end of 2022 and ballooned from there.
"I'm terrible [at gambling.] Never going to do it again. Never won any money," Mizuhara said. "I mean, I dug myself a hole and it kept on getting bigger, and it meant I had to bet bigger to get out of it and just kept on losing. It's like a snowball effect."
After Ohtani agreed to pay the debts, Mizuhara said on Tuesday, Ohtani logged onto his own computer and sent the wire transfers under Mizuhara's supervision in installments over several months last year. They added "loan" to the description field in the transactions.
Asked why Ohtani didn't simply give him the money instead of paying Bowyer's associate directly, Mizuhara said Ohtani didn't trust him with the money.
"He didn't want me to gamble it away," Mizuhara said.
Mizuhara said he told Ohtani he would pay him back."

JFC.

welp, kinda glad he didn't choose the giants now...

But who is on the plane to Toronto?

https://twitter.com/barry/status/1770574974484447522

def covering it up manfraud literally doing nothing

This is sus as fuck at best. The changing stories definitely lead me to believe something else is going on

Dude was making millions a year. What a fucking moron.

https://twitter.com/UnfortunateMLB/status/1770620534293733556

This is gonna get buried and you're never gonna hear about it again.

Fall guy

I liked the idea of Ohtani's translator stealing the money and Ohtani saying, "Nani?" In the interview when asked the question.

But it's more than likely Ohtani was betting on all kinds of sports through this dude including baseball

Pete Rose is rolling over in his California King bed as we speak

the interesting thing to me is that this "Bookie" he was betting with is also under investigation. which means he was gambling illegally. jesus christ. talk about killing the golden goose. Even 1% of a 700mil contract is, what, 7mil?

yikes

Tyranthraxus posted...

This is gonna get buried and you're never gonna hear about it again.

L

[LFAQs-redacted-quote]

Not caring about money makes you more likely to gamble, not less.

Pete Rose is banned forever but Ohtani will get elected to the HOF with 100% of the vote, there is no justice.

[LFAQs-redacted-quote]

People claim to not care about things like money all the time, especially when youre the current face of your sport lmao

A dude getting some of the most lucrative contracts in the history of the sport obviously cares about money to some extent

Am I missing something here, why is this board seem to have hatred towards Ohtani? He did something?

crayola555 posted...

Am I missing something here, why is this board seem to have hatred towards Ohtani? He did something?

if you want to bet on sports, but you don't ever actually want to be caught handing money to someone on your own, what is the first logical alternative you're going to take?

GuerrillaSoldier posted...

if you want to bet on sports, but you don't ever actually want to be caught handing money to someone on your own, what is the first logical alternative you're going to take?

You get someone to place the bets for you.

How about this reasoning then, if you are definitely aware enough that you hire a guy to do your betting on activities you want unseen, why would you all of a sudden make a few payments on your own account with your own name to said activity?

Ippei got fired? Damn. It's not often a superstar is so famous, people recognize his interpreter immediately, too. But yeah, I would find it a little hard to believe Shohei was gambling and Ippei is his patsy somehow. Still not a good look for the international golden boy, though -- he's mostly been scandal-free up to this point.

unless the feds come out and say ohtani was the one betting or indict him mlb won't go after him. so far they are saying the opposite

crayola555 posted...

Am I missing something here, why is this board seem to have hatred towards Ohtani? He did something?

I dont hate Ohtani at all. I just think this whole thing is really fishy.

Unless there's a digital trail that shows that 1) Othani placed the bets and 2) There were bets on baseball, this will become a non-story by May.

So why are we jumping to a conclusion that ohtani was gambling here?

Dat_Cracka_Jax posted...

So why are we jumping to a conclusion that ohtani was gambling here?

Because of the specific details around Ohtani "loaning" money to his interpreter willy nilly to pay his debt because he's "disinterested" in making almost a billion dollars.

So there is high suspicion Ohtani had the interpreter serve as his middle man to place bets for him. That's bad.

bigblu89 posted...

Unless there's a digital trail that shows that 1) Othani placed the bets and 2) There were bets on baseball, this will become a non-story by May.

apparently ohtani's account was used to pay the debt with an illegal wire. originally the translator said ohtani paid the debt for him, the next day he walked it back and said ohtani didn't know about the debt. all we know is that ohtani's account sent wires totaling 4.5 million over a period of time.

it's possible ohtani could have been the one betting, it's also possible the original story that he paid off the debt is true and his lawyers backtracked when someone realized that would be an illegal action (though a minor one he likely wouldn't be in trouble for).

unless someone comes out with evidence against ohtani directly it will blow over eventually. even if ohtani was the one betting it appears the translator is willing to take the fall.

i am kinda willing to believe ohtani wasn't the one betting just because sending wires totaling millions of dollars from his accounts to the bookmaker would be world class stupidity. it does seem shady that the story changed, but that is probably just his lawyers shielding him from any criminal liability

Jagr_68 posted...

Because of the specific details around Ohtani "loaning" money to his interpreter willy nilly to pay his debt because he's "disinterested" in making almost a billion dollars.

So there is high suspicion Ohtani had the interpreter serve as his middle man to place bets for him. That's bad.

ohtani has famously not cared about money before he even got to the mlb. that could be looked at either way, if he is a longtime degen gambler it would make sense that his parents handled his finances previously, but usually that kind of thing would have come out by now and he has been p clean to this point

andel posted...

ohtani has famously not cared about money before he even got to the mlb. that could be looked at either way, if he is a longtime degen gambler it would make sense that his parents handled his finances previously, but usually that kind of thing would have come out by now and he has been p clean to this point

You dont think getting a $700 million dollar contract could change how someone views money

Apparently the title of thread is outdated. Ohtani paid the friend debt on his own.

I wonder why they changed the story. They had to have a lot of time to come up with a story for the media.

Whatta world. I mean it's his money though he shouldn't be betting on baseball for sure, but sports gambling is so normalized now.

I just don't trust anyone anymore *sigh* but this ultimately doesn't change my opinion of him. I thought he was pretty cool.

BlueTigerLion posted...

Apparently the title of thread is outdated. Ohtani paid the friend debt on his own.

I wonder why they changed the story. They had to have a lot of time to come up with a story for the media.

The story didn't change that much. I guess they were trying to not contradict Mizuhara at first but then the investigation turned up evidence that what they originally said wasn't true.

Assuming the wire transfer story doesn't get proven wrong I think this sounds kind of believable. Unless Ohtani has a history of gambling before I think it's unlikely that he'd suddenly start dropping that level of money right off the bat.

andel posted...

it's also possible the original story that he paid off the debt is true and his lawyers backtracked when someone realized that would be an illegal action (though a minor one he likely wouldn't be in trouble for).

This seems most likely to me. He wanted to help his friend and didn't realize that what he was doing was illegal. I think he might get fined for it, but he certainly won't be arrested or deported or anything like that.

Jagr_68 posted...

Because of the specific details around Ohtani "loaning" money to his interpreter willy nilly to pay his debt because he's "disinterested" in making almost a billion dollars.

So there is high suspicion Ohtani had the interpreter serve as his middle man to place bets for him. That's bad.

I think the story of ohtani directly paying the debt because he didn't trust the interpreter to not just gamble it all away makes sense

ssb_yunglink2 posted...

You dont think getting a $700 million dollar contract could change how someone views money

i don't see how that would cause a massive change in outlook that 100 million + didn't.

UnholyMudcrab posted...

This seems most likely to me. He wanted to help his friend and didn't realize that what he was doing was illegal. I think he might get fined for it, but he certainly won't be arrested or deported or anything like that.

yeah, makes sense to me. of course anything is possible, but unless we get actual evidence that he was the one betting i think it's reasonable to take this at face value

Dat_Cracka_Jax posted...

I think the story of ohtani directly paying the debt because he didn't trust the interpreter to not just gamble it all away makes sense

That's not unreasonable in a vacuum, it's exactly how I'd recommend handling debts for a recovering addict.

It seems like the issue is the shifting story.

Ohtanis interpreter about to do sepokku for him

DrizztLink posted...

That's not unreasonable in a vacuum, it's exactly how I'd recommend handling debts for a recovering addict.

It seems like the issue is the shifting story.

It's against the law with a huge fine and a 2 year prison sentence at min

CADE_FOSTER posted...

It's against the law with a huge fine and a 2 year prison sentence at min

It's a max of two years, not a minimum

https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/1084

CADE_FOSTER posted...

It's against the law with a huge fine and a 2 year prison sentence at min

Can you elaborate?

I think I'm missing something but I'm not very knowledgeable about sport betting.

I just mean that in and of itself it's the best way to go about paying debts for an addict, but if there are extenuating circumstances then that definitely changes things.

Look

Ohtani can be some secret gambling junkie and his interpreter was his fall guy

Or they actually fucking each other.

I don't know what to believe any more

On the surface just paying a debt isnt a bad thing. If he was paying him to place bets for him thats another thing

CADE_FOSTER posted...

It's against the law with a huge fine and a 2 year prison sentence at min

I had no idea and I'm sure ohtani (who's not even from this country) didn't either

having no knowledge of the law is not an excuse unless you are Donald Trump