All-Time Scum: As If Stealing Nearly $17M From Ohtani Wasn't Enough, Ippei Mizuhara Once Pocketed a $60K Check From Shohei, Meant To Pay For His Dental Work, And Then Charged The Dentist Trip On The Superstar's Debit Card

JUNG YEON-JE. Getty Images.

Yesterday the Ohtani-Ippei Mizuhara gambling/theft scandal neared its conclusion as the baseball superstar's former interpreter officially plead guilty to bank fraud. He's facing a maximum 33 year sentence for stealing nearly $17M from Ohtani. 

(CBS Sports) Ippei Mizuhara, the former interpreter for Dodgers superstar Shohei Ohtani, has agreed to plead guilty in the gambling scandal in which he has been accused of stealing almost $17 million from the baseball player and using it to place illegal bets, the U.S Attorney's Office for the Central District of California announced Wednesday.

Mizuhara, described by the Attorney's Office as Ohtani's "de facto manager," will plead guilty to one count of bank fraud and one count of subscribing to a false tax return at an arraignment scheduled for May 14. He faces a maximum sentence of 33 years in prison, five years of supervised release and a fine of $1,250,000.

The official story is that Ohtani transferred over all his bank security privileges to Ippei, which then allowed the interpreter to access all of his funds and pay off his mountain of illegal gambling debts to a bookmaker behind Shohei's back. Ippei impersonated Ohtani over countless phone calls with the bank while also lying to his agents and money people, none of whom spoke Japanese. 

As part of his job duties, Mizuhara regularly interacted with Ohtani's sports agents and financial advisors – who did not speak Japanese – on behalf of Ohtani, who did not speak English….When Ohtani's sports agent and financial advisors asked Mizuhara for access to the bank account, Mizuhara lied and said Ohtani did not want them to access the account because it was private

Side note, but it's CRAZY to me that no one at a gigantic sports agency like CAA spoke a lick of Japanese. You'd think the moment they land Ohtani they at least hire one person who spoke his language so they wouldn't have to deal with a secondary source like Ippei. There must be thousands of employees at CAA. Nope, let's all trust Ippei. 

Advertisement

As the story goes, Ohtani was oblivious to everything happening, despite seemingly spending every waking second with his interpreter. Some of it still doesn't seem to add up, but the Feds and IRS had nothing to gain by sparing Ohtani from any wrong doing. A little tidbit in the recent report that pushes you to believe Ippei was truly a heartless, evil fella was this dental work situation. 

In September 2023, Ohtani agreed to pay for Mizuhara's $60,000 dental work and provided him with a check. Instead, according to prosecutors, Mizuhara paid the bill with Ohtani's debit card and deposited the check into his personal account.

First of all, how about Ohtani basically being this guy's dental insurance? You don't pay a thing and he foots the whole bill, what a guy. Second, what the hell was Ippei getting done in his mouth that cost $60,000??? Dentist getting away with actual robbery here. And lastly, Ippei was a fucking monster, huh? Just pocketing the $60k into his own account and also charging Ohtani on his debit card for the teeth. Stealing $17M for illegal gambling wasn't enough, nope had to milk him for every dollar possible. He was literally paying for the whole dental work, but Ippei saw that as an opportunity to take more from him. That's next level, god-tier greed. Nasty, nasty work. It's shocking that Shohei has any money left at all if he was willing to do this kind of shit. 

It appears that since Ippei immediately plead not guilty and didn't fight this in the courts that he's going to able to lessen the sentence. He'll still serve some legit time in prison, but nowhere near the 33 years. By no means am I a legal expert, I just read tweets that seem like they know what they're talking about, and I used to watch the show Suits. 

Good news for Shohei, Ippei is going to have to pay back all the money he stole in the first place. 

The 39-year-old former interpreter will be required to pay full restitution to his victims, which includes $16,975,010 to Victim A, Ohtani, and $1,149,400 to the IRS.

Ah yes, I'm sure an ex-interpreter who has no way of getting his old job back is going to be able to come up with $16,975,010 in no time. Just add that to the deferred Dodgers money he'll see after retirement. 

Dude really fumbled the biggest bag imaginable. Making hundreds of thousands of dollars to basically be Ohtani's best friend and live a lavish lifestyle, all thrown away just like that. What an insane story. 

P.S. If you thought this would all impact Ohtani's performance on the field, well he's off to the best start of his career. Through 38 games he's slashing .355/.425/.678 with 11 homers and 27 RBI. Dude's a living God.