Baseball fans can’t help but go crazy for Shohei Ohtani. Especially in his home country.
When the two-way Dodgers superstar and the rest of Team Japan arrived at Shin-Osaka Station on Sunday in Osaka, just days before the start of the 2026 World Baseball Classic, fans watching the team disembark from a train were quiet. At first, anyway.
Then Ohtani stepped off, and cheers erupted almost instantly.
It’s little surprise Ohtani would be Samurai Japan’s greatest draw: Not only is the four-time MVP coming off his second straight World Series win with the Dodgers, but it was Ohtani who clinched Japan’s 2023 WBC victory by striking out Mike Trout to beat the U.S. in the championship game. In the tournament, Ohtani hit .435 with a home run, eight RBIs and a 1.345 OPS while pitching 9 2/3 innings, striking out 11 hitters and posting a 1.86 ERA.
Ohtani won’t be pitching in the 2026 WBC, but he’ll still be the star of a Japanese squad featuring MLB standouts such as Yoshinobu Yamamoto, Yusei Kikuchi, Seiya Suzuki and Masataka Yoshida.
Team Japan will play its final tune-ups against two Nippon Professional Baseball teams -- the Orix Buffaloes and Hanshin Tigers -- on Monday and Tuesday before starting WBC Pool C play at 5 a.m. ET on Friday against Chinese Taipei.