Shohei Ohtani finally lands in Toronto, homers in first at-bat vs. Blue Jays

Shohei Ohtani was booed heavily by Blue Jays fans before his first plate appearance on Friday night at Rogers Centre in Toronto. But then he responded by hitting a home run.

The home run was Ohtani’s seventh, tying him with his manager Dave Roberts for the most in franchise history by a player born in Japan. Ohtani also walked and scored in his second trip to the plate, in the third inning.

Blue Jays fans were simply expressing their frustration over a player in Ohtani they thought the team might sign over the offseason. After all, he did meet with Blue Jays brass during the process, and Toronto was heavily reported to be in the mix for his services.

But some of the reporting surrounding Ohtani’s free agency was too aggressive, and wrong, as it turned out. J.P. Hoornstra at Dodgers Nation reported on December 8 that Ohtani and the Blue Jays reached agreement on a contract, and Jon Morosi of MLB Network tweeted that Ohtani was in fact on a plane to Toronto, presumably to seal the deal.

Neither happened, and on December 9, Ohtani himself announced on Instagram that he signed with the Dodgers, a contract hat totals $700 million (over time) for 10 years of his services.

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Jack Harris at the Los Angeles Times this week interviewed the photographer who tracked the infamous plane to Toronto on December 8, one that very much did not have Ohtani inside, but did have ‘Shark Tank’ entrepreneur Robert Herjavec:

“The plane lands, and I’m like, ‘S---,’” Osorio recalled this week. “We get there just in time to see Robert getting out of this plane and going into a car. That was it.”

Ohtani met with reporters on Wednesday in Washington D.C., and said back in December at home in Newport Beach, he was also tracking the flight.

“I was just following the news,” Ohtani said Wednesday, per Bill Plunkett at the Orange County Register. “I knew I wasn’t on that flight. So I was curious too.”

Harris in his story notes that Dodgers manager Dave Roberts was golfing with actor Brian Baumgartner, among others, when rumors of Ohtani signing with Toronto broke. I enjoyed this detail of that golf round from back in February by Fabian Ardaya and Ken Rosenthal at The Athletic:

“I’m usually off my phone. But then my phone is just blowing up non-stop,” Roberts said. “I literally couldn’t even get the ball off the tee. It was, like, miserable.”

Baumgartner recalled specifically that on the 14th hole, Roberts’ game “blew up,” one thing after another going wrong.

As the group got to 15, no one said a word to Roberts, observing a respectful silence.

“I’m sort of pleading with Brian the whole day, going, ‘Dude, I promise I’m not that bad,’” Roberts recalled. “And then we get to 15 and I bomb a drive like 340 because I just said, screw it.”

After that brief scare in December, the Dodgers are just glad the eagle has landed.