Shohei Ohtani Apparently Lied About Meeting the Fan Who Caught His First Dodgers Home Run Ball As The Fan Now Says She Was Pressured By The Team Into Accepting a Low Ball Offer In Exchange For It

Allen J. Schaben. Getty Images.

Anytime a poor schmo out there gets a fast one pulled on them for a valuable baseball, the internet loves to have a good ol’ group chuckle. People who give up the chance to make six figures on a baseball in exchange for just a few signed bats and a picture with the player solely to be viewed as a good person deserve to be laughed at. Well, that’s what happened with a woman who caught Shohei’s first Dodger homer last night, a piece of memorabilia estimated to be worth at least $100,000. A woman who of course goes by 'sugartitts' on twitter. 

Now usually when a fan catches one of these historic homers the m.o. is to immediately find the authenticator in the stadium, verify the baseball, and get the hell out of there. Regroup at home and then decide what you wanna do. If you leave without authenticating the ball then you’ll never be able to prove you have the real one. 

Well, the Dodgers made sure that wasn’t gonna happen. 

They got to this woman first, separated her from her husband, and intimidated her until she basically gave it up for nearly nothing. Short of shooting this woman in the knee with a pistol they followed the Jack Bauer game plan enough that he'd be proud. 

In this case, though, Roman and Valenzuela say the security staff separated them, pressured them, and left them little choice but to hand over the baseball for a low-ball offer. The Dodgers initially dangled two caps signed by Ohtani in exchange for a ball that an auction house representative told The Athletic would be worth at least $100,000. Roman said the hardball tactics by team officials included the threat of refusing to authenticate the baseball if she decided to take it home. This was no trivial matter: A lack of authentication would render the ball worthless, all but forcing her to accept the trade.

They left Dodger Stadium with two signed hats, a signed bat and ball, a slight bump after the opening offer of two signed hats. They never met Ohtani, despite the two-way superstar claiming through an interpreter that he’d met the fan after the game.

But here’s the most interesting part of all this. Shohei apparently lied to the media that he met the woman. 

SugarTitts confirmed. 

(For anyone curious, Ohtani was standing next to the translator when this was said to the media)

Now I don’t know about you, but if I was in the middle of a major investigation where my course of action to absolve myself of all wrong doing was to accuse someone else of being a pathological liar, then I myself would do my best to tell the truth for the foreseeable future. 

So either one of two things are true

1) Shohei is the absolute worst at hiring translators. They continuously put him in the worst positions and never listen to a word he says. Not one time have they ever been on the same page. Shohei says the sky is blue, they say purple. 

2) (the way more fun storyline) Shohei is a legitimate pathological liar who cannot be trusted with any story he tells

I tell ya what. Shohei is quickly losing the benefit of the doubt if it really turns out he lied to the public about meeting this woman. If it’s truly lost in translation then sure it is what it is, but at some point enough of these stories come out where even his most loyal followers question what the hell is going on. After the statement he gave everyone wanted to believe him, but with this now? Maybe trusting him isn't the move. It’s been quite the first month in Dodger Blue for Ohtani, but maybe we're just witnessing the birth of his villain origin story.