Up until Friday, the prank war between Dodgers superstar Shohei Ohtani and manager Dave Roberts had been rather one-sided. But then, Roberts struck back with a stunt so good that even Ohtani couldn’t help but admit that the two were now even.
On Friday night, the Dodgers shared a video of Ohtani walking to the parking lot, only to find that his car had been packed with hundreds of multicolored ball-pit balls, which began pouring out onto the pavement as Ohtani opened his door.
It didn’t take long for Ohtani to figure out the culprit, as Roberts left a picture of himself laughing at the scene and put his face on all the balls.
“Okay,” a smiling Ohtani said after finding the picture of Roberts. “Now tied.”
Roberts also took credit for the prank in a video message.
“Alright, Shohei. You got me the first round,” Roberts said. “I told you, you know what they say about payback. So what I have done is -- you see this pretty face right here, that’s me with all these balls. And I put all these balls in your car. So, enjoy it, keep these pictures, and have fun cleaning your car out.”
Roberts’ prank was a measure of revenge after Ohtani pulled multiple car-related gags on the Dodgers skipper going back to last season, the two-way superstar’s first with the club -- a not-too-shabby 50/50 campaign culminating in the 30-year-old's third unanimous MVP Award in four years.
Last May, when Ohtani was on the verge of breaking Roberts’ record for the most home runs by a Japanese-born player in Dodgers history, Ohtani told Roberts that he bought him a car to commemorate the occasion, then handed over a toy Porsche. It was a callback to the previous December, when Ohtani gifted Joe Kelly’s wife Ashley a Porsche -- a real one -- after the reliever agreed to give Ohtani No. 17.
Ohtani got Roberts again after arriving to Spring Training last month, leaving another (slightly larger) toy Porsche in Roberts’ parking spot.
While Roberts may have gotten back at Ohtani on Friday, the real winner of the whole ordeal might have been Decoy, Ohtani’s dog, who had a blast playing with the giant pile of ball-pit balls the manager left behind.
Now that the two are even, though, Roberts fully expects Ohtani to strike back.
"I'm not scared," Roberts said. "I'm on guard."