WHEN THE SUPERSTAR SLUGGER LAUNCHED THE RECORD-BREAKING BALL INTO THE STANDS AT DODGER STADIUM, ONE LUCKY FAN WAS THERE TO SCOOP IT UP
By Steve Lansdale
Until a few months ago, Los Angeles native Jason Patino had never stepped foot in Dodger Stadium. Though he grew up in L.A., money was tight back then and tickets to Dodgers games weren’t in the budget. So when he and his family arrived at their seats the afternoon of April 21, Patino was content just to watch his hometown team play in person for the first time. Becoming a part of baseball history wasn’t on his to-do list.
But that all changed when Dodgers superstar Shohei Ohtani blasted New York Mets pitcher Adrian Houser’s third-inning slider over the right field fence. The shot proved to be the game-winning hit in L.A.’s 10-0 victory over the Mets. But of far greater significance was the fact that it was Ohtani’s 176th home run in the major leagues, elevating him above former New York Yankees star Hideki Matsui for the most MLB home runs ever hit by a Japanese player.
On April 21, Shohei Ohtani set the home run record for Japanese-born major leaguers. The ball he hit that day is available in Heritage’s August 23-25 Summer Platinum Night Sports Auction.
“What’s funny about that is that we got there late,” Patino says. “We didn’t get to our seats until the second inning. When he hit it, I didn’t even realize who had hit it. I was looking at my wife, making sure it didn’t hit her.”
The ball sailed over the Patinos, only to ricochet back into their section. “When he hit it, everyone around us jumped to try to catch it,” Patino says. “After it went over us, it bounced back toward us. People were reaching for it, and I just fell on it. Someone said, ‘Oh my God, you got it.’ I still didn’t know who hit the ball, so after I picked it up, I just sat down and was talking to people around me. But everyone was grabbing me, shaking me, telling me right away what it was, and it was like, ‘This ball is valuable!’”
That sentiment might prove to be a massive understatement once the ball crosses the block in Heritage’s August 23-25 Summer Platinum Night Sports Auction, where it’s estimated to sell for $200,000 or more.
The next indication of the ball’s significance came when a Dodgers staffer approached Patino almost immediately to get it authenticated. “I was pulled away by security and was told, ‘We’re going to give you something for it.’ They said, ‘We want to get the ball back. It’s a Hall of Fame ball.’ But I wasn’t giving it back. This is history! This is a life-changing ball.”
Los Angeles native Jason Patino shows off his prize at Dodger Stadium.
Patino’s instincts, born from the brief conversations with those around him after he pounced on his new prize, were accurate, considering Ohtani’s stature in the game and in his home country. In Japan, players who are skilled in both pitching and hitting are called nitoryu – or “two-sword style” – a nod to the samurai warriors of Japan’s past. By that definition, Ohtani is the ultimate nitoryu. A dual-threat player so proficient as both a hitter and pitcher that he has drawn comparisons to Babe Ruth, Ohtani is universally regarded as one of the greatest players in the game. Even after learning last August that a torn ulnar collateral ligament in his pitching elbow meant the end of his 2023 season and surgery that would relegate him to designated hitter this year, the Dodgers inked him to a 10-year, $700 million contract that dwarfed the 12-year, $426.5 million deal that made former Los Angeles Angels teammate Mike Trout the game’s highest-paid player in 2019. Some suggested that Ohtani would be better served, and extend his career, if he gave up pitching and focused on rewriting the record books with his bat. All indications are that he intends to pitch again, but even if he can’t, the Dodgers were all in on adding him to their lineup.
In Japan, Ohtani is not just a local star whose talent afforded him the chance to play in the United States. At home, he enjoys rock-star status. In a 2022 nippon.com poll, Ohtani outclassed all others in a ranking of the nation’s most popular athletes, pulling in 29.1% of the vote. Figure skater Yuzuru Hanyu placed second, with 5.5%, followed by legendary baseball star Ichiro Suzuki at 3.2%. So beloved is the Dodgers star that his vote total outpaced the rest of the top 10 vote getters by more than 50% combined.
“He’s a legendary player, but he’s more than just a good player,” Japanese baseball fan Hotaru Shiromizo told the Associated Press in 2023. “His aspirations – his achievements – have had a positive influence on all Japanese people. All the kids want to be like Ohtani.”
The ball’s authenticity is evidenced by the MLB holographic sticker affixed to its surface.
When Patino was whisked away by team security, he got confirmation that the ball was the one that gave Ohtani the MLB record for home runs by a Japanese player. “The guy who authenticated it even congratulated me,” he says. In exchange for the record-breaking ball, the team offered Patino a ball signed by Ohtani and a shirt.
“It was kind of overwhelming,” he says. “So I asked, ‘Can I sit on this?’ They said, ‘You need to make a decision.’ I told them, ‘You know where I’m sitting – let me finish the game. Let me sit down and think about it.’” Patino says he learned that Ohtani is generous with his signature and that a ball bearing the star’s autograph can be had online for a couple of hundred dollars, a fact that only reinforced his decision to decline the team’s trade offer.
After the game, Patino returned home and immediately put the ball in a safe. Since then, he has done interviews with members of the Japanese media, some of whom said they would love to see the ball end up in the Japanese Baseball Hall of Fame in Tokyo. For Patino, the whole experience has been, in a word, “crazy.” “We were just going to a Dodgers game,” he says, “my first one ever, and we ended up with a piece of baseball history.”
STEVE LANSDALE is a staff writer at Intelligent Collector.