'Seeing her is a piece of history': Ohtani, Roberts meet 100-year-old Nagasaki survivor

DENVER -- When Dodgers play-by-play broadcaster Stephen Nelson told Shohei Ohtani about the woman in the wheelchair a few yards behind them, Ohtani immediately went over, knelt down and shook her hand.

Ohtani, who had just finished throwing in the outfield prior to Saturday night’s game against the Rockies at Coors Field, was meeting 100-year-old Momoyo Nakamoto Kelley.

Kelley, who was born in Japan and survived the atomic bomb blast in Nagasaki on Aug. 9, 1945, emigrated with her husband to the United States in the early 1950s. She currently lives in Salt Lake City, and she was visiting family in nearby Fort Collins, Colo., when her grandson, Patrick Faust, led an effort to make a dream of hers a reality.

Kelley loves baseball. And on Saturday, she said she experienced “a dream come true.”

“Just the idea that 100 is such a big number,” Patrick said of the impetus behind his desire to have his grandmother on the field. “I don’t think there are many people [still alive from] when the atom bomb was dropped. She’s had a terrible experience, a big one. So we wanted to [do something] special. She watches all the Dodgers games and all the Rockies games.

“Within the past few years, especially, with all the Japanese players in the game, she’s been really into it.”

Besides Ohtani, Kelley also met Japanese right-hander Roki Sasaki and manager Dave Roberts, who himself was born in Japan.

And it was just as much of a thrill for those who met her, as it was for her to meet them.

“It was really a pleasure meeting her,” Roberts said. “She was 19 when the a-bomb dropped in Nagasaki. And it’s by a miracle that she lived to tell her story. Just seeing her is a piece of history.”

Kelley described how she saw the atomic explosion when it hit Nagasaki as being “like the sky was on fire.” Thankfully, she was “upwind” from it, as her son-in-law, Paul Faust, described it.

One individual who was visibly emotional after meeting Kelley was Nelson, who is of Japanese heritage and couldn’t hold back tears while describing what it was like.

“I think …” Nelson began before stopping to compose himself.

“Forgive me.”

As a tear trickled down his face, he continued.

“It’s humbling,” Nelson said. “Just being ‘Yonsei’ [a great-grandchild of a Japanese immigrant], you’re standing on a lot of shoulders. For her to experience what she went through and endure that, and come here to make a better life for herself and future generations … we can’t even fathom that, right?

“And that’s why I think it’s important to hear their stories and to pass their stories along to future generations, so people don’t forget. It’s important for us to document them and honor them. I wish I had better words [to convey it].”

Ohtani signed a baseball and posed for a photo with Kelley. And as incredible as that moment was for her and her family, it was uniquely special when she met Rockies right-hander Tomoyuki Sugano.

Kelley has been following Sugano’s career since he played for the NPB’s Yomiuri Giants, from 2013-23.

“I like so many of the players,” she said. “[Yoshinobu] Yamamoto, Sasaki, and Sugano-san.”

“Honestly, you don’t get these kinds of opportunities often,” Sugano said through interpreter Yuto Sakurai. “So I’m really happy I got to meet her and was given this type of opportunity. She said she’s really passionate and really likes watching baseball and is a fan of my former team [in NPB].”

Among Kelley’s earliest memories of following baseball was watching Joe DiMaggio toward the end of his career after arriving in America in the early ’50s.

But the memories she made on this day some 75 years later -- for herself, her family and those who had the privilege of meeting her -- will be indelibly imprinted in the minds and hearts of so many whose lives she has touched.