Prior to Ohtani, no major league player had signed contracts worth more than 500 million U.S. dollars. Mike Trout (L.A. Angels) paid more than 400 million dollars. Locally, people wondered if Ohtani could break the 500 million dollar mark for the first time. As the free agent market got closer, people believed it was possible, and the mood seemed to make a contract worth more than 500 million dollars a fait accompli. However, Ohtani exceeded the offer made by the Los Angeles Dodgers, which had been making a firm decision by vacating the team’s annual salary for a year or two to recruit Ohtani.

Ohtani and the Dodgers made a 10-year contract that destroyed common sense of $700 million. When the news first broke, some people thought it was “fake news.” This was by far the highest amount in the history of the four major professional sports in the United States. $500 million is also great, but it jumped 600 million dollars and went straight to 700 million dollars. No one knows when this record will be broken.

In addition, it turned out that there was a clever provision. Otani receives only $20 million for 10 years, 2 million dollars per year. The remaining $680 million was included as a payment grace period. Otani also made concessions instead of increasing the total amount because it could be difficult to strengthen the team’s power if he gave himself a lot of money. Some analysts say that the actual value of the Otani contract is in the mid-to-late $400 million range for a 10-year total due to the deferred payment clause.

In any case, everyone paid attention to Ohtani’s performance in his first season, which was a huge contract. Due to his elbow surgery last year, Ohtani’s trademark pitching and batting cannot be performed this year, but if so, much attention was paid to what kind of performance Ohtani, who is committed to hitting, will make. A year later, Ohtani has proved that he is worth $700 million. It has literally been an all-time season.

Ohtani, who finished the 2024 regular season after an away game against Colorado on the 30th (Korea Standard Time), recorded a batting average of 0.310, an on-base percentage of 0.390 and a slugging percentage of 0.646, on-base plus slugging percentage (OPS) of 1.036, 54 homers, 130 RBIs, 197 hits, 134 runs, and 59 steals in 159 games this season. OPS fell slightly from last year (1.066) but set his career high records in each category. Hitting, homers, RBIs, steals, hits, runs scored, and hits all set new personal records.

Despite his excellent basic record, Ohtani solidified his image as an icon of the Major League by opening the door to the club with 50 home runs and 50 steals, which no one has ever recorded in the history of the Major League. Home runs and stolen bases are relatively opposite areas, so it is difficult to catch them at the same time, and only five players joined the 40-40 club in the Major League before Ohtani. However, Ohtani progressed step by step toward 50-50 by banking on his home run from the beginning of the season and stolen bases that caught fire from the middle of the season. Ohtani, who set a 40-40 record in at least games, then maintained his explosive pace and achieved 54 home runs and 59 steals beyond the 50-50, which he thought would be impossible.

Having devoted himself to hitting, Ohtani appeared in the most at-bats in the National League this year, ranking first in home runs, RBIs and runs scored. He is also the highest in on-base percentage and slugging percentage in the league. Unfortunately, he failed to make the triple crown as he lost the title he aimed until the end to Luis Arraez (San Diego Padres), but he still had a historic season with 50-50 points. He even broke the record of the most stolen bases (56) held by Ichiro Suzuki in stolen bases, solidifying his image as an all-around player. Ohtani also succeeded in all of his last 35 attempts to steal bases this season, recording the second longest successive stolen bases (38 consecutive times in 1975 by Davy Lopez). This record can be challenged next year as well.

In his first year as a Dodgers pitcher, Ohtani broke the club’s record. Ohtani started as a second hitter this year but moved to the leadoff game due to Mookie Betts’ fractured injury in the middle of the season, scoring 134 points in this season, breaking Freddie Freeman’s previous franchise record of 131 points. The same goes for home runs. He broke his previous record of 49 home runs, and set a new club record of 94 home runs, which Babe Herman had in 1930.

Ohtani also posted a total of 411 hits, tying for fifth in the Ruta season in the history of the league. The only players who recorded more hits than Ohtani were Stan Musial (429 hits), Sammy Sosa (425 hits) in 2001, Luis González (419 hits) in 2001, and Sammy Sosa (416 hits) in 1998, both of which were on par with Barry Bonds (411 hits) in 2001. He became the first player to hit 400 hits in a single season since 2001.

Then, did Ohtani return his salary without pitching to the Dodgers? For now, it is possible to conclude that Ohtani did enough, even if he simply set the standard of 700 million U.S. dollars on the surface, regardless of his present value. While playing as a designated hitter this year, Ohtani suffered a loss in his contribution to win (War) compared to replacement players. As he did not play as a pitcher, he was expected to show weak performance in the War compared to other players with positions. However, Ohtani accumulated a 9.2 WAR based on the statistics website “Fangraph.”

FanGraphs translated into 73 million dollars. Simplifying the 10-year, 700 million dollars is an average of 70 million dollars per year, but Ohtani, who is the only batter, has succeeded in extracting this value without having to throw or hit. This was hard for anyone to predict, and the Dodgers, who already screamed happily in commercial sales with Ohtani, deserves a big smile. 안전놀이터

Ohtani is also certain to become the third MVP in his career. Ohtani won MVP awards in 2021 and 2023 when he was a member of the Los Angeles Angels. It was also unanimous. 2021 was a year that literally meant a fantasy of both pitching and batting.