Dodgers Team News

Dodgers Made Offer To Shohei Ohtani In Final 24 Hours To Complete Richest Deal in Sports History: Report

“Stunned.”

“Omfg.”



Within the baseball industry, reactions from those who had been following Shohei Ohtani’s free agent negotiations from the beginning differed little from the reaction among fans. 

The final terms of the $700 million contract between the Dodgers and Ohtani – the richest in sports history – had not been finalized Friday when Dodgers Nation reported Ohtani was sold on the Blue Jays’ final offer. It is believed the Dodgers’ last offer to Ohtani pushed them over the top at the 11th hour.

Exactly how last-minute was the coup? The Dodgers didn’t know they had won the Ohtani bidding “as of late (Friday) night,” according to MLB Network’s Jon Heyman.

Clearly, Ohtani had not shut the door on a “final offer” besides the Blue Jays’ after narrowing his list of possible destinations in the last week. Multiple sources told Dodgers Nation that Ohtani’s camp previously extended the Dodgers the right to match or exceed competing offers. 

Saturday, the Dodgers’ final offer won out.

Ohtani’s change in sentiment transpired in less than a day. Ohtani’s time in a Dodgers uniform will last another 10 years.

His time on the Dodgers’ payroll will last even longer, according to multiple reports:

The full details of Ohtani’s contract are not yet known. For now, we know it took a late swing for the fences by the Dodgers to get it done. And they knocked it out of the park.

Photo Credit: Raj Mehta-USA TODAY Sports

JP Hoornstra

J.P. Hoornstra writes and edits Major League Baseball content for DodgersNation.com and is the author of 'The 50 Greatest Dodger Games Of All Time.' He once recorded a keyboard solo on the same album as two of the original Doors. Follow at https://x.com/jphoornstra

20 Comments

  1. You’re still writing for this site? How is that possible?

    And P.S. How about an apology?

  2. If the Dodgers don’t improve their starting pitching, this signing will not make much of a difference.

  3. JP – I give you all the credit for the report yesterday that “leaked”. It clearly had the desired effect of making Ohtani angry at the Blue Jays and causing him to sign with LA. That was some next-level spy craft. We’re tempted to give Ashley Kelly all the credit, but I think was you. Well done.

  4. Love to see Yamamoto join his compatriot, friend and erstwhile teammate. They would be a World Series threat for years. Also be fun to see Ohtani support Yamamote from the batter’s box as well as to friendly compete with him on the mound. If Kershaw returns and stays healthy, 2025 might feature Kershaw, Ohtani and Yamamote as part of a 5 or 6 man rotation. Woo hoo. Let’s do it!

  5. Lost all respect for you for the fake news you posted and for leaving the post up even after most sources were reporting that Ohtani had not made a decision yet. You left the post up hoping that if he eventually went to the Jays, you’d still be the first one to report it. Shameful. And you’ll be remembered in the most negative of ways. Even Morosi apologized for incorrectly reporting that he was flying to Toronto. You neither took the post down nor apologized.

    1. Leaving incorrect posts up is what journalists do to show integrity, not the other way around. It’s so people can see their errors and form part of their public track record. Deleting posts that prove to be wrong reduces integrity as it would be manipulating the record and make it seem they have a better track record than they do.

  6. Lost all respect for you for the fake news you posted and for leaving the post up even after most sources were reporting that Ohtani had not made a decision yet. You left the post up hoping that if he eventually went to the Jays, you’d still be the first one to report it. Shameful. And you’ll be remembered in the most negative of ways. Even Morosi apologized for incorrectly reporting that he was flying to Toronto. You neither took the post down nor apologized.

  7. Hoornstra is a complete clown. He is scrambling to craft a narrative here in order to cover up his prior FALSE reports. Kick this dude to the curb.

  8. JP all is good. We got Shohei. Sometimes things happen out of our control. All the craziness that happened yesterday led the Dodgers to finally close the deal.

  9. J.P.,

    You’re a solid writer. People make mistakes. You would think all the people piling on against you had never made a mistake before. I, for one, have made some big ones and learned so much from some of them that I’m almost glad I made the mistakes in the first place. That’s life. My advice is to own your mistake an move on. It’s gonna hurt for awhile — maybe even a long time — but you’re going to survive this. No matter what happens, whether you stay here or move on…you’ll still be writing about sports for a full-time living…Stay humble. You got this!

    1. Well said Chet. Owning it and appologizing would solve everything. Look at Sherzer to the Padres for ken Rosenthal. We all make mistakes, JP has left it to dmac to take the heat! Very bad form!

  10. Lost all respect for JP and Dodgers Nation site. To make false reports is very irresponsible. You can’t make reports about something being done until it is, just to be first and for clicks. SMH.

  11. Much different tune than he’s going to the Blue Jays, and reiterating it the next day. You took a calculated risk with guessing and lost. Nothing you say on this matter will be taken with any sort of credibility.

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