If you move to another country and don't know the language or grammar, how do you open up a bank account? You'll have to trust someone to fill out all the paperwork and open online banking. I'm sure Ippei helped him with that.

Assistant stolen money from their rich boss is more common than you think. And Ippei is like that to shohei, he's not only interpreter. He handling his buseveryday. DANEL KIM said　　 When I worked as an interpreter, I had to assist the players on just about every aspect of their daily lives. These include: opening bank accounts, taking them to DMV to get licenses, and setting up utilities. I also carried their check books on the road for clubhouse dues.

He didn't even read the statement. He looked into the camera most of the time.

Overthinking such a simple case, ohtani just got rob nothing overly dramatic like a "fall guy" fairytale situation..😅

Those who know his upbringing and personality know that he is an honest person. He believed that he should be trusted as a person rather than as a player. Ohtani is completely innocent👍

AJ, it's also illegal to use and possess steroids. How many players have ever been charged for that?

They didn’t allow cameras because there was too much equipment in the room.

This is why I keep saying. Whoever is in charge of His finances has to be involved in this scandal. Like when you're a basically a billionaire. Cause that's what he is. You have people to handle your business. This man had, does it do anything for himself. So for that? Yes, it's kind of hard to believe for us. People who are not that rich. This man is rich and doesn't give a shit about money. But financial advisor accountant, someone who has been appointed to take care of his finances. Those people need to be questioned because they have to have been involved. Ohtani needs to clean house plain and simple cause. At this point I would trust absolutely. Nobody in my team.

People are talking like he only has 1 bank account. It is plausible that Shohei gave access to one of his many accounts with a couple of millions of dollars to Ippei and asked him to take care of certain types of expenses for him.

Simple things guys...cameras weren't allowed because the room was too small. Ohtani makes waaaaay more than 20 mil per year from endorsements. Over 50 million in 2023 and over 60 million this year.

Ippei has been playing his own life's version of Leonardo DiCaprio's "Catch Me if You Can".

He doesn't care about money and literally said that the amount of money he makes is "stupid." Ohtani probably has half a bill in his account earning 0.25% interest. He's not going see $500k withdrawals when 10s of millions are coming in and especially if Ippei was overseeing it all.

It is not like he has one account where all the money is located. He probably has many accounts including investment accounts. The money can get moved around and “hidden”. That being said manage the managers!

1st Much more to come out as this will last years!

Shohei was making over 60 million a year…

Nope it was reported that shohei made 65 mil last year on endorsements alone.. Bryce Harper was second highest at 7 mil believe me this Guy definitely has over 100 mil in his account and believe me a guy like shohei who only focuses on baseball can definitely miss 500k going missing every few months

LOL, AJ @11:39 and then Erik's reaction. 😂

This has happened numerous times in Hollywood when an actor or actress has allowed their agent access to their bank accounts. This appears to be a similar arrangement.

people on about he should have taken questions, well again how much can he say or no, it's an ongoing criminal investigation where he may be restricted to what he can say as to not compromise the investigation.

In March of last year, Ohtani was interviewed by South Korea media. Ohtani said in an interview that he personally really likes Korean players, but ippei interpreted that he personally had no special feeling toward the Korean national team. From then on, Korea fans did not trust ippei's interpreter.

TY Kratz... some people are really good at making it but terrible at the responsibility and accountability of maintaining and keeping it. Making money and managing money are two unrelated skills and abilities. And some people want to focus on their craft and will maybe look at their balance a handful of times a year and delegate the responsibility...

AJ's joke at 1:27 actually raises a key point to keep in mind with this - that some of the question-marks and eyebrow-raising inconsistencies in the first couple days as this scandal was unfolding could have been related to points getting lost in translation between English and Japanese. That could happen innocently when communicating something delicate/complex, and of course it's also possible that some things were deliberately mistranslated.

No way are the Dodgers' attorneys going to allow anyone, including Dave Roberts field questions while these investigations are ongoing.

Everyone seems to talk "control bank account" just frankly (it might be intentional). It has a wide range of meaning from someone has his credit card, someone writes check to pay bills for him, all the way to talking to a bank to initiate $500k wire transfer. The destination of money was the account belonging to illegal gamble operation. Hope people are talking about the very specific one. It is a gross negligence by the banking industry.

Scott, was that a serious question about why couldn’t they just have released a press release, rather than have him read it in person?

AJ has the mind of a literal 13 year old can’t see anything from any other perspective than his own just stubborn and ignorant

Innocent until proven guilty is a very strange concept for many people it seems, until it’s them.

The term “steal” sounds criminal.. will charges be brought?

Yall sound like u reading from mlb cue card

Gotta look into the betting history. Gotta see if any irregularities show up. Definitely reeks of a cover up.

You can probably smell it for miles, cause it’s pretty deep.

There was too many people in that room for cameras. The dodgers filmed it, don’t make something out of nothing

If there were wire transfers the bank has the responsibility to verify it.

he's going to bash 60

Smells like sushi to me. Shohei is a global I icon. He ain't that stupid. The orginal story was the true story.

the e-transfers happened in Sept-Oct 2023. What was Shohei doing? Getting surgery and on pain meds. Shohei relied on Ippei while Shohei was on pain meds. Easy to get hoodwinked. Tax Accountants won't realize missing funds until tax season due in April 2024. Not yet April, so Tax Accountants won't know.

I stand by Shohei through and through

I think there is more to their relationship that they are hiding, that is why he has access to his bank account like most GFS do.. just think about it

AJ is a cornball. Yes it is Ohtani fault for letting his interpreter have full access to his accounts but there's a difference between giving someone money and having money stolen from you. Another washed former MLB player that is hating lol

lie detector test

No bank on planet Earth would allow these payments to be made without 1000% certainty that the account holder was approving the transaction.

aj has no idea what hes talking about

Ippei Mizuhara had Power of Attorney over an account with 10 million dollars in it -- a charity account which Ohtani hardly ever paid attention to. The Japanese media has been reporting this FOR FOUR SOLID DAYS! The Japanese media actually took the time to contact the (Japanese) banks and confirmed that Shohei had signed over Power of Attorney to Ippei. This is OLD NEWS and yet a lot of people apparently want to continue pretending not to believe it. I say "PRETENDING" on purpose. If the Japanese press can confirm the banking information (and who contrlled the account) by contacting the bank, then there are only a limited number of reasons why US sources are not reporting the same information. NONE of those reasons are particularly flattering to the US media (Im looking at YOU ESPN) This is CLICKBAIT, folks. NOTHING ELSE! Anyone casting doubt on Shohei's explanation is playing the same BS game that BSPN was playing when they broke the story -- reporting half-truths that they KNEW to be half-true, just because a scandal about Shohei is better clickbait than a scandal about a crooked personal assistant. Either that ... or theyre just plain-old-incompetent as journalists, and need to be fired, pronto.

Is this going to turn into a witch hunt?

Why didn’t any player come forward after meeting? To open bank you need two forms of ID. I don’t expect a slap on wrist in 2024 as betting a lot bigger today!!

In 1989 if we would have just believed Pete Rose he would be in the Hall of Fame right now

I am just sick of this nation. The shit we bitch over . And we are all guilty of something . Or have been. Or just never caught . Are we that hypocritical of a Nation ?!

AJ says, "I look at money at least once a week", no disrespect, you were not making Othani money!

You guys are late! July 22, 2022, a bet of $1,000,000 was placed for the Atlanta Braves to score over 6.5 runs against the Los Angeles Angels parlayed with Braves -3.5. The bet was placed with a bookie in Mizusawa (Shohei's home town). The pitcher for the Angels that day? Shohei Ohtani. The stats for Shohei that day were as followed, 6.1 IP, 6 H, 6 ER and 1 BB. At the plate you ask? 0-3 with 2 strike outs. Shohei is done!

scam friend Ippei being exposed. It's that simple

Bro is gonna speedrun the English language or have massive trust issues now.

I wonder how Ippei got Ohtani to verify such large transactions with the bank. Did he tell Ohtani they were taxes owed to the state of California. If he told him it was for gambling debts then Ohtani knew and is now lying.

No one knew where he was going to sign until he announced it. And no one knew that he got married until he announced it. So if he really was gambling, I don't think you would hear a peep about it because that debt would have been paid off already lol. And he has the money to do so. Ippei, on the other hand, does not even though his yearly salary reportedly was actually quite a lot. But certainly not more than what Shohei earns a year. So there's no way Shohei would slip up and get into enough debt for this situation to come out in the open.

Shohei didn't clarify anything, how about the signatures on the 2 checks for $500.00 each the reporter said she saw with her own eyes? Why did he give his interpreter the account numbers and passwords for his banking information?... there was no information or clarification...ijs

You guys sound ignorant. You have no idea what it’s like to be a foreign in this country let alone if dont speak English. He had to rely on his people and his interpreter was his friend of course he trusted in him. Of course he needed help w English and his bank accounts of u think the bank had people speaking Japanese to him. Get real, I’m Mexican from Mexico knew no English but learned quick and my parents have me do the speaking for them for years. They trusted in me to get across what they were saying. You guys have no clue.

Not buying this as presented. But MLB does not want to harm the reputation of its new Golden Goose.

The sports media needs to stop acting ignorant. Everyone with a brain knows Ohtani didn't do anything wrong. Stop appeasing conspiracy theorists and racist haters.

Want to know what I really think happened?? I think Ippie, had gambling debts, told Ohtani, and Ohtani not knowing actual rules regarding that, did pay to help out a friend. Then, when Ohtani & his party found out that was indeed illegal, Ippei agreed to be a fall guy. If they are actually good friends. Ippei will be that fall guy, and go back to Japan, or home state. I think Ohtani helped a friend out, found out the truth & had an oh shit moment

There is NO way this guy could steal this much money the federal government would flagged a wire transfer for that much money and the banks would have wanted to hear directly from Ohtani there's a huge coverup going on here.

If you believe Ohtani than you are a fool 😂😂

Dudes lying

Everything definitely does not add up with all these changing stories. However, even if Shohei is betting on sports who gives a sh*t as long as he isn't betting on baseball. If he did use an illegal bookie give him a fine and move on. This story is bigger than it should be. What a joke.