August 18, 2026 • 20 mins
Betrayal listeners, we're excited to share a special ad-free preview of Episode One of this season of ESPN’s 30 for 30 Podcasts: The Betrayal of Shohei Ohtani.
Episode 1: "The Letter O" — ESPN Investigative Reporter Tisha Thompson receives a tip that, if true, could damage Shohei Ohtani’s picture-perfect reputation.
If you enjoyed what you heard, you can binge all six episodes of The Betrayal of Shohei Ohtani on the 30 for 30 Podcasts feed or by searching for "The Betrayal of Shohei Ohtani" on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, or wherever you get your podcasts.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hey everyone, it's Andrea. You know, growing up in Philly,
sports were never something you watched casually. They were personal
part of your identity really, and when you're a lifelong
sports fan like me, you understand loyalty between a team
and its fans, between lifelong teammates, and between an athlete
and the people they trust most. So when I heard
(00:21):
a story that brings sports and betrayal together, I had
to know more. Shohei Otani was one of the most
celebrated athletes in the world, but behind his meteoric rise
was a mysterious man. Otani trusted more than almost anyone,
his interpreter. After six years working alongside Otani, his interpreter
(00:42):
became a close confidant. But that relationship built on years
of trust almost threatened everything. ESPN investigative reporter Tisha Thompson
and her team broke the story. Now they're taking us
inside the investigation to show us how it all really unfolded.
For our trail listeners, I'm excited to share a special
(01:02):
preview of episode one of this season of ESPN's thirty
for thirty podcasts, The Betrayal of show. Hey Otani, this
is the letter, Oh enjoy.
Speaker 2 (01:22):
Sam. It's November twenty twenty four and the Los Angeles
Dodgers are in their home stadium celebrating their World Series win.
The players line up on the podium. Team manager Dave
Roberts takes the mic and introduces some of the stars, Bron, Bron, Bron,
(01:47):
and then he calls out the name everyone's waiting for
from showtime. Show. Hey Otani just finished his first season
with the Dodgers. He's a head taller than a lot
of his teammates, and he's wearing a T shirt and
backwards ball cap. When he gives a shy grin as
(02:07):
he takes the mic, this is so special woman. This
is one of the first times that show he has
spoken publicly in English without an interpreter. I'm so owner
here and congress, That's all he says, and the crowd
(02:36):
absolutely loves it. By any measure. Show Hayes first season
with the Dodgers was extraordinary. Here's a two one show
he all times and October holdout th rod home wrong times.
(02:58):
There bruna a chime player.
Speaker 3 (03:07):
One of a chime season.
Speaker 4 (03:10):
Soho heyo Toni starts the.
Speaker 5 (03:12):
Fifty fifty club.
Speaker 2 (03:17):
Many believe he could become the best baseball player of
all time.
Speaker 5 (03:21):
It's really not hyperbole guys to say that sho hey
Otani is the new Babe ruth.
Speaker 3 (03:26):
Oh Tani Dfield fart care about it.
Speaker 2 (03:35):
It's the kind of success that helps overshadow what happened
just months before at the start of this season, when
shohe was caught up in a scandal that could have
ended at all.
Speaker 1 (03:47):
We're going to turn to the scandal rocky Major League Baseball,
soho hey Otani, it's set to address the media today.
The scandal has the potential to be one of the
biggest sports scandals that we've ever seen, certainly one of
the biggest baseball scandals that we've ever seen.
Speaker 2 (04:00):
Team at ESPN broke the story. It tied the money
of one of the highest paid players in baseball history
to a vast illegal sports betting operation. But when it
was over, he would walk away and someone else, someone
close to him, would confess to a shocking crime, disappearing
(04:23):
in disgrace, and in this moment at the World Series celebration,
you could almost forget it ever happened. But two years later,
I still have so many questions. So I'm going to
travel the country, chase down leads, and try to understand
(04:43):
how one of sports most complicated friendships detonated into one
of the biggest scandals in baseball history.
Speaker 1 (04:55):
Probably the greatest player that ever played the game.
Speaker 4 (04:59):
Bet the game quest that wire transfer four and a
half million dollars to a southern California bookmaker, and he
has no idea of it.
Speaker 2 (05:08):
I'm ESPN investigative reporter Tisha Thompson from thirty to thirty podcasts.
This is the Betrayal of Sho Hey o Tani, Episode one,
The Letter Oh. I started working on this story a
year before show Hey won that World Series when a
(05:28):
source sent me a tip. At first, the tip seemed
to have nothing to do with baseball or any sport.
It was information from a federal court document still under seal,
a list of items that had been seized from a
house in California. It included the kinds of things you
might expect from a federal raid computers, hard drives, and
(05:50):
cell phones, but there were also forty thousand dollars brightling watches,
handbags from chanell Ermez Louis Vuitton, and casino chips. Lots
and lots of casino chips. Why were the FEDS interested
in it? Because all of these things were taken from
(06:11):
a house owned by a man named Mad Boyer. The
FEDS also seized a cash counting machine, sports betting records,
and receipts for offshore bankwires. And that's when I say
to myself, I think Matt Boyer is a bookie, a
person who takes bets, pays them out when they win,
(06:34):
and collects when they lose. My source confirms it. Matt
Boyer is a bookie, but he isn't just any bookie.
According to my source, his clients include celebrities, millionaires, and
seemingly one of the most famous athletes in the world.
When my source tells me the name of that athlete,
it's a name so big, so shocking, that all I
(06:57):
write down is the letter, Oh, you.
Speaker 6 (07:02):
Tell me the name of the athlete involved, and that
the FEDS are evolved in an investigation. And that is
why we have to be so careful.
Speaker 2 (07:12):
This is my editor, Elaine Tang.
Speaker 6 (07:14):
We're really worried about putting a rumor out there that
then comes back to us as fact. We have to
be really careful about going out and saying like, hey,
like do you think is show Hey Otani gambling with
a bookie?
Speaker 2 (07:26):
This tip was so potentially damning we needed to tread
really carefully because it could turn into a very grown
up version of that kid's game Telephone, where someone whispers
something to someone and then they whisper it to someone
else and by the time it comes back to you
it's totally different from what you said. I couldn't just
ask sources questions like hey, to show Hey gamble, Even
(07:47):
if the answer was no. They might tell someone else
in the clubhouse that ESPN was asking if show Hey gambled,
and then that person says to someone else, Hey, I
heard show Hey gambles. By the time I call several
someonees later, that person then says to me, oh, yeah,
I have heard he gambles. All I have done is
confirm a rumor that I started a rumor about Shohei
(08:09):
Otani paying millions of dollars to an illegal bookie.
Speaker 6 (08:12):
I think it was the amount of money involved, as
well as the caliber of the athlete that feels really
loaded and you know, extremely damaging if true, right to
the athlete, their reputation, their career.
Speaker 2 (08:29):
It's a very serious allegation. I want to learn everything
I can about what someone could get themselves into betting
with a bookie. So I head to the sports betting
epicenter of the country.
Speaker 4 (08:41):
We are in Las.
Speaker 2 (08:42):
Vegas, Baby, I'm in Las Vegas to meet with the
reporter I think knows more about bookies and sports betting
than anyone else in the business.
Speaker 4 (08:51):
What do you think the biggest money maker is? Where
the fenom penny slot? That's correct.
Speaker 2 (08:58):
This is ESPN's David Purdam. I met him in a
casino just off the Vegas Strip. We sit down in
a room near the sports book watching as people place beds.
Did they put the sports book in the back on purpose?
Speaker 5 (09:12):
Make you walk through all the flock of sheets.
Speaker 2 (09:18):
I wanted to talk to Perdam about the tip I
received because he has a massive rolodex of sources in
the sports betting world. Had you ever heard of Matt
Boyer before?
Speaker 4 (09:27):
I had not, never heard of him.
Speaker 2 (09:29):
We gave you Matt Boyer's name, and you called sources.
You do the David Purdam magic and disappear for twelve
hours and came back with info.
Speaker 4 (09:40):
Right. I usually go to you start with your guys
that you know have had this and when they didn't know,
I had to expand and I did and found some
people that knew of him. And then when we found
out that he was coming to Vegas with a lot,
I talked to people here and they knew of him.
Speaker 2 (09:57):
A source warrened Purdham that Boyer was connected to a
man with a dangerous reputation, a guy named Owen Hanson,
a former usc football player who became known as the
Coking QB. When I got the original tip, Hanson was
in prison for bookmaking and drug trafficking and was rumored
to have ties to the cartel.
Speaker 4 (10:18):
We had a source who was involved with running money
for that group, and he was telling us be careful,
right because Owen Hansen was not known as a good person.
He was known as a violent person around the betting community,
and when we was ties to Boyer, there was concern.
Speaker 2 (10:40):
Over the next few weeks, we gathered more sources and
confirmed Boyer was running a huge sports book operation in
southern California. Is California more prolific with bookies than other
parts of the world.
Speaker 4 (10:54):
Massive massive book making operations in California? Why because there's
no legal sports.
Speaker 2 (10:58):
But Wort's betting is now legal in thirty nine states
plus Washington, DC, and Puerto Rico. Depending on where you live.
You can place bets through a state licensed app, a website,
or in a casino or a bar in those states,
but unless you're betting on a horse race, sports betting
in California is illegal. There is no legal way to
(11:21):
place a sports bet there. Not on DraftKings, not on FanDuel,
not in the tribal casinos. So if you live in
California and you want to bet on sports, you either
have to go somewhere like Vegas or find a bookie,
which is of course illegal. But there are many reasons
why someone might want to use a bookie, even if
(11:42):
the state they live in has legal sports betting. Kurdam
says A big reason is credit.
Speaker 4 (11:48):
People want to bet on credit. You don't want to
give over your cash. If you can bet on credit,
huge advantage. I can just place my bet for one
hundred dollars and my money never changes hands. You go
down one thousand bucks. Guy says, Okay, let's meet up
at the waffle house and you go there and you
pass over an envelope, and that's how it's done.
Speaker 2 (12:07):
Another reason someone might seek out. A bookie is anonymity.
Speaker 4 (12:11):
If you are an athlete betting with the DraftKings, there's
a chance that we could find it. But if you
can be betting with this legal sports book over here,
I would not be able to know it.
Speaker 2 (12:24):
So Purdam says, a celebrity who wants to bet discreetly
might use a bookie. When I told him that show
hey O Tawani was the athlete my source told me
might be involved with Matt Boyer, I was stunned.
Speaker 4 (12:38):
I remember when you relayed the message to who the
athlete was. I was like, oh my gosh, I believe
I cursed.
Speaker 2 (12:47):
Why is sports betting such a sensitive topic for Major
League Baseball?
Speaker 4 (12:54):
Well, you start with the Black Sox. Way back at
the beginning of the century. Cargo White Sox, several players
of them got engaged with some criminals and they allegedly
agreed to throw a World Series.
Speaker 2 (13:13):
Major League Baseball banned eight players from the Chicago White
Sox for life, and after that scandal, the league created
a set of rules about betting on sports. It forbids players,
coaches and staff from using a bookie, and you may
never bet on baseball.
Speaker 4 (13:30):
So that was the big one. The next time you
get some sort of betting scandals. Pete Rose number.
Speaker 1 (13:35):
Four thousand, one ninety two bankespeed rolls the all time
Major League Baseball hit later.
Speaker 4 (13:43):
All time hits leader. He was eventually admitted to betting
on the game of baseball. I was wrong. I'm just stupid.
Worst thing ever did in my life.
Speaker 2 (13:53):
In nineteen eighty nine, MLB punished Pete Rose with a
lifetime ban for betting on baseball. Pete Rose was one
of the greatest ballplayers of his generation. He holds records
that have never been broken, but all of his feats
on the field have been overshadowed by what he did
off the field. Could show Hao Tani, the greatest player
(14:15):
of his generation, be the next Pete Rose.
Speaker 4 (14:19):
If they were to have found out that he was
betting on baseball, he would have been banned for life.
And this is your biggest star band for life.
Speaker 2 (14:29):
Part of what made the allegation so shocking was how
Sho Hao Tani had a reputation for being squeaky clean
before this. There's never been a whisper of a scandal
attached to his name, which makes it all the more
surprising to hear allegations that he might be tied to
a bookie with dangerous connections, but we realized we don't
(14:51):
actually know all that much about show his life outside
of baseball.
Speaker 5 (14:55):
He is the most guarded and protect athlete that I
think I've ever been around.
Speaker 2 (15:03):
This is ESPN's Tim Kewan. Tim specializes in writing profiles
of the most famous and oftentimes controversial names and sports
people like Barry Bonds, Aaron Rodgers, Floyd Mayweather Junior. Tim
says he's been trying to decipher the enigma that is
show hey Otawani ever since he first arrived here in
(15:24):
the United States.
Speaker 5 (15:25):
When he came here, I first started observing him, knowing
that I was going to have to observe him to
write about him rather than talk to him, because it
was established early on that it was a dead end.
He will only take questions about the game, and very few,
three maybe four in each language, and these are in
like bit questions. I want to know, like you just
(15:47):
threw one hundred and seventeen pitches, are you what do
you feel today? And he would not He just doesn't
entertain those. He's just not built that way.
Speaker 2 (15:55):
Tim says, most of what you know about showhy is
limited to what show Hay is willing to tell you,
and it rarely leaves the realm of the ballpark, and
when it does, it's on show Hay's terms. Like when
he got married, people didn't even know show Hay was
in a relationship until he posted about his wife on Instagram.
Speaker 3 (16:14):
He has lots of titles MVP, Gazillionaire, Superstar, but husband
had eluded him until now. And he made the announcement
where else but on social media that reads, not only
have I begun a new chapter in my career with
the Dodgers, but I also have begun a new life
with someone from my native country of Japan, who is
very special to me. And I wanted everyone to know
(16:36):
I am now married.
Speaker 2 (16:38):
Show He's teammates and even Dodgers manager Dave Roberts didn't
know about it, and I felt like it was a
good time because before the season I didn't want really
any distractions.
Speaker 5 (16:50):
The season started, I think there is this this sort
of the aura, right, like, just leave him alone to
do what he does because the distractions are not something
he's interested in. He's not interested in talking to me,
to be honest. He does it as an obligation after
he pitches. He hits two home runs in a game,
he'll stand there and answer questions in the most anadyne
(17:13):
way possible.
Speaker 4 (17:14):
Are you nervous at all? Playing in the postseason for
the first time?
Speaker 2 (17:21):
But the league, the teams, and the fans don't seem
to mind not knowing much about show his life off
the field because what's happening on the field is record
breaking the strikeout.
Speaker 5 (17:32):
He's really challenged our idea of limits because he has
shown his talent to be limitless. He does the two
things that excite baseball people more than anything else.
Speaker 4 (17:42):
Well Tony Dios take called strike three.
Speaker 5 (17:45):
He can throw a baseball over one hundred miles an hour,
and he can hit a ball five hundred feet over
the road. It's like the two headline acts of baseball.
He is among the best in the world at both,
if not the games.
Speaker 4 (18:01):
There goes Old Toddy. It's a leadoff home run after
he struck out three at the top.
Speaker 2 (18:07):
Of the first.
Speaker 5 (18:08):
He is a dream for Major League Baseball.
Speaker 2 (18:12):
And the Dodgers rewarded him in the fall of twenty
twenty three with a record breaking contract. It is the
announcement that took the Baseball World by storm today.
Speaker 5 (18:20):
Seven hundred million dollars over ten years.
Speaker 4 (18:23):
Oh my goodness, come on.
Speaker 2 (18:29):
One of the league's premier franchises made a historic bet
on show Hay because they knew his success would be
their success. They stood to make a lot of money too,
ticket sales, merchandise partnerships. Show his success could pay off
big time for the Dodgers in MLB, show Hey himself
makes more than one hundred and twenty five million dollars
(18:51):
in endorsements a year, with much of that money coming
from advertisements. In Japan, when I was.
Speaker 5 (18:58):
There, I was shot. You could literally not walk more
than two blocks in Tokyo without seeing his face on something,
whether it was a green tea or a water sports drink,
or Hugo Boss or something. I mean, everywhere is Otani.
Speaker 3 (19:14):
After touching down in Tokyo, It's easy to see otani
Mania is really a thing.
Speaker 2 (19:21):
Everyone in Japan is, by default a Showhy fan.
Speaker 5 (19:27):
The appetite for Otani, the love for Otani appears to
be as limitless as his talent.
Speaker 2 (19:33):
If Showhey reputation takes a hit, it wouldn't just turnish
his name. It would have devastating consequences for the Dodgers,
for major League Baseball, and for Japan.
Speaker 1 (19:46):
Thank you so much for listening. If you enjoyed what
you heard, you can now binge all six episodes of
The Betrayal of Sho hey Otani on the thirty for
thirty podcast feed, or by searching the Betrayal of Show
hey Otani on the iheartra You app, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube,
or wherever you get your podcasts. I hope you enjoy
this podcast as much as I do.
Hey everyone, it's Andrea. You know, growing up in Philly,
sports were never something you watched casually. They were personal
part of your identity really, and when you're a lifelong
sports fan like me, you understand loyalty between a team
and its fans, between lifelong teammates, and between an athlete
and the people they trust most. So when I heard
(00:21):
a story that brings sports and betrayal together, I had
to know more. Shohei Otani was one of the most
celebrated athletes in the world, but behind his meteoric rise
was a mysterious man. Otani trusted more than almost anyone,
his interpreter. After six years working alongside Otani, his interpreter
(00:42):
became a close confidant. But that relationship built on years
of trust almost threatened everything. ESPN investigative reporter Tisha Thompson
and her team broke the story. Now they're taking us
inside the investigation to show us how it all really unfolded.
For our trail listeners, I'm excited to share a special
(01:02):
preview of episode one of this season of ESPN's thirty
for thirty podcasts, The Betrayal of show. Hey Otani, this
is the letter, Oh enjoy.
Speaker 2 (01:22):
Sam. It's November twenty twenty four and the Los Angeles
Dodgers are in their home stadium celebrating their World Series win.
The players line up on the podium. Team manager Dave
Roberts takes the mic and introduces some of the stars, Bron, Bron, Bron,
(01:47):
and then he calls out the name everyone's waiting for
from showtime. Show. Hey Otani just finished his first season
with the Dodgers. He's a head taller than a lot
of his teammates, and he's wearing a T shirt and
backwards ball cap. When he gives a shy grin as
(02:07):
he takes the mic, this is so special woman. This
is one of the first times that show he has
spoken publicly in English without an interpreter. I'm so owner
here and congress, That's all he says, and the crowd
(02:36):
absolutely loves it. By any measure. Show Hayes first season
with the Dodgers was extraordinary. Here's a two one show
he all times and October holdout th rod home wrong times.
(02:58):
There bruna a chime player.
Speaker 3 (03:07):
One of a chime season.
Speaker 4 (03:10):
Soho heyo Toni starts the.
Speaker 5 (03:12):
Fifty fifty club.
Speaker 2 (03:17):
Many believe he could become the best baseball player of
all time.
Speaker 5 (03:21):
It's really not hyperbole guys to say that sho hey
Otani is the new Babe ruth.
Speaker 3 (03:26):
Oh Tani Dfield fart care about it.
Speaker 2 (03:35):
It's the kind of success that helps overshadow what happened
just months before at the start of this season, when
shohe was caught up in a scandal that could have
ended at all.
Speaker 1 (03:47):
We're going to turn to the scandal rocky Major League Baseball,
soho hey Otani, it's set to address the media today.
The scandal has the potential to be one of the
biggest sports scandals that we've ever seen, certainly one of
the biggest baseball scandals that we've ever seen.
Speaker 2 (04:00):
Team at ESPN broke the story. It tied the money
of one of the highest paid players in baseball history
to a vast illegal sports betting operation. But when it
was over, he would walk away and someone else, someone
close to him, would confess to a shocking crime, disappearing
(04:23):
in disgrace, and in this moment at the World Series celebration,
you could almost forget it ever happened. But two years later,
I still have so many questions. So I'm going to
travel the country, chase down leads, and try to understand
(04:43):
how one of sports most complicated friendships detonated into one
of the biggest scandals in baseball history.
Speaker 1 (04:55):
Probably the greatest player that ever played the game.
Speaker 4 (04:59):
Bet the game quest that wire transfer four and a
half million dollars to a southern California bookmaker, and he
has no idea of it.
Speaker 2 (05:08):
I'm ESPN investigative reporter Tisha Thompson from thirty to thirty podcasts.
This is the Betrayal of Sho Hey o Tani, Episode one,
The Letter Oh. I started working on this story a
year before show Hey won that World Series when a
(05:28):
source sent me a tip. At first, the tip seemed
to have nothing to do with baseball or any sport.
It was information from a federal court document still under seal,
a list of items that had been seized from a
house in California. It included the kinds of things you
might expect from a federal raid computers, hard drives, and
(05:50):
cell phones, but there were also forty thousand dollars brightling watches,
handbags from chanell Ermez Louis Vuitton, and casino chips. Lots
and lots of casino chips. Why were the FEDS interested
in it? Because all of these things were taken from
(06:11):
a house owned by a man named Mad Boyer. The
FEDS also seized a cash counting machine, sports betting records,
and receipts for offshore bankwires. And that's when I say
to myself, I think Matt Boyer is a bookie, a
person who takes bets, pays them out when they win,
(06:34):
and collects when they lose. My source confirms it. Matt
Boyer is a bookie, but he isn't just any bookie.
According to my source, his clients include celebrities, millionaires, and
seemingly one of the most famous athletes in the world.
When my source tells me the name of that athlete,
it's a name so big, so shocking, that all I
(06:57):
write down is the letter, Oh, you.
Speaker 6 (07:02):
Tell me the name of the athlete involved, and that
the FEDS are evolved in an investigation. And that is
why we have to be so careful.
Speaker 2 (07:12):
This is my editor, Elaine Tang.
Speaker 6 (07:14):
We're really worried about putting a rumor out there that
then comes back to us as fact. We have to
be really careful about going out and saying like, hey,
like do you think is show Hey Otani gambling with
a bookie?
Speaker 2 (07:26):
This tip was so potentially damning we needed to tread
really carefully because it could turn into a very grown
up version of that kid's game Telephone, where someone whispers
something to someone and then they whisper it to someone
else and by the time it comes back to you
it's totally different from what you said. I couldn't just
ask sources questions like hey, to show Hey gamble, Even
(07:47):
if the answer was no. They might tell someone else
in the clubhouse that ESPN was asking if show Hey gambled,
and then that person says to someone else, Hey, I
heard show Hey gambles. By the time I call several
someonees later, that person then says to me, oh, yeah,
I have heard he gambles. All I have done is
confirm a rumor that I started a rumor about Shohei
(08:09):
Otani paying millions of dollars to an illegal bookie.
Speaker 6 (08:12):
I think it was the amount of money involved, as
well as the caliber of the athlete that feels really
loaded and you know, extremely damaging if true, right to
the athlete, their reputation, their career.
Speaker 2 (08:29):
It's a very serious allegation. I want to learn everything
I can about what someone could get themselves into betting
with a bookie. So I head to the sports betting
epicenter of the country.
Speaker 4 (08:41):
We are in Las.
Speaker 2 (08:42):
Vegas, Baby, I'm in Las Vegas to meet with the
reporter I think knows more about bookies and sports betting
than anyone else in the business.
Speaker 4 (08:51):
What do you think the biggest money maker is? Where
the fenom penny slot? That's correct.
Speaker 2 (08:58):
This is ESPN's David Purdam. I met him in a
casino just off the Vegas Strip. We sit down in
a room near the sports book watching as people place beds.
Did they put the sports book in the back on purpose?
Speaker 5 (09:12):
Make you walk through all the flock of sheets.
Speaker 2 (09:18):
I wanted to talk to Perdam about the tip I
received because he has a massive rolodex of sources in
the sports betting world. Had you ever heard of Matt
Boyer before?
Speaker 4 (09:27):
I had not, never heard of him.
Speaker 2 (09:29):
We gave you Matt Boyer's name, and you called sources.
You do the David Purdam magic and disappear for twelve
hours and came back with info.
Speaker 4 (09:40):
Right. I usually go to you start with your guys
that you know have had this and when they didn't know,
I had to expand and I did and found some
people that knew of him. And then when we found
out that he was coming to Vegas with a lot,
I talked to people here and they knew of him.
Speaker 2 (09:57):
A source warrened Purdham that Boyer was connected to a
man with a dangerous reputation, a guy named Owen Hanson,
a former usc football player who became known as the
Coking QB. When I got the original tip, Hanson was
in prison for bookmaking and drug trafficking and was rumored
to have ties to the cartel.
Speaker 4 (10:18):
We had a source who was involved with running money
for that group, and he was telling us be careful,
right because Owen Hansen was not known as a good person.
He was known as a violent person around the betting community,
and when we was ties to Boyer, there was concern.
Speaker 2 (10:40):
Over the next few weeks, we gathered more sources and
confirmed Boyer was running a huge sports book operation in
southern California. Is California more prolific with bookies than other
parts of the world.
Speaker 4 (10:54):
Massive massive book making operations in California? Why because there's
no legal sports.
Speaker 2 (10:58):
But Wort's betting is now legal in thirty nine states
plus Washington, DC, and Puerto Rico. Depending on where you live.
You can place bets through a state licensed app, a website,
or in a casino or a bar in those states,
but unless you're betting on a horse race, sports betting
in California is illegal. There is no legal way to
(11:21):
place a sports bet there. Not on DraftKings, not on FanDuel,
not in the tribal casinos. So if you live in
California and you want to bet on sports, you either
have to go somewhere like Vegas or find a bookie,
which is of course illegal. But there are many reasons
why someone might want to use a bookie, even if
(11:42):
the state they live in has legal sports betting. Kurdam
says A big reason is credit.
Speaker 4 (11:48):
People want to bet on credit. You don't want to
give over your cash. If you can bet on credit,
huge advantage. I can just place my bet for one
hundred dollars and my money never changes hands. You go
down one thousand bucks. Guy says, Okay, let's meet up
at the waffle house and you go there and you
pass over an envelope, and that's how it's done.
Speaker 2 (12:07):
Another reason someone might seek out. A bookie is anonymity.
Speaker 4 (12:11):
If you are an athlete betting with the DraftKings, there's
a chance that we could find it. But if you
can be betting with this legal sports book over here,
I would not be able to know it.
Speaker 2 (12:24):
So Purdam says, a celebrity who wants to bet discreetly
might use a bookie. When I told him that show
hey O Tawani was the athlete my source told me
might be involved with Matt Boyer, I was stunned.
Speaker 4 (12:38):
I remember when you relayed the message to who the
athlete was. I was like, oh my gosh, I believe
I cursed.
Speaker 2 (12:47):
Why is sports betting such a sensitive topic for Major
League Baseball?
Speaker 4 (12:54):
Well, you start with the Black Sox. Way back at
the beginning of the century. Cargo White Sox, several players
of them got engaged with some criminals and they allegedly
agreed to throw a World Series.
Speaker 2 (13:13):
Major League Baseball banned eight players from the Chicago White
Sox for life, and after that scandal, the league created
a set of rules about betting on sports. It forbids players,
coaches and staff from using a bookie, and you may
never bet on baseball.
Speaker 4 (13:30):
So that was the big one. The next time you
get some sort of betting scandals. Pete Rose number.
Speaker 1 (13:35):
Four thousand, one ninety two bankespeed rolls the all time
Major League Baseball hit later.
Speaker 4 (13:43):
All time hits leader. He was eventually admitted to betting
on the game of baseball. I was wrong. I'm just stupid.
Worst thing ever did in my life.
Speaker 2 (13:53):
In nineteen eighty nine, MLB punished Pete Rose with a
lifetime ban for betting on baseball. Pete Rose was one
of the greatest ballplayers of his generation. He holds records
that have never been broken, but all of his feats
on the field have been overshadowed by what he did
off the field. Could show Hao Tani, the greatest player
(14:15):
of his generation, be the next Pete Rose.
Speaker 4 (14:19):
If they were to have found out that he was
betting on baseball, he would have been banned for life.
And this is your biggest star band for life.
Speaker 2 (14:29):
Part of what made the allegation so shocking was how
Sho Hao Tani had a reputation for being squeaky clean
before this. There's never been a whisper of a scandal
attached to his name, which makes it all the more
surprising to hear allegations that he might be tied to
a bookie with dangerous connections, but we realized we don't
(14:51):
actually know all that much about show his life outside
of baseball.
Speaker 5 (14:55):
He is the most guarded and protect athlete that I
think I've ever been around.
Speaker 2 (15:03):
This is ESPN's Tim Kewan. Tim specializes in writing profiles
of the most famous and oftentimes controversial names and sports
people like Barry Bonds, Aaron Rodgers, Floyd Mayweather Junior. Tim
says he's been trying to decipher the enigma that is
show hey Otawani ever since he first arrived here in
(15:24):
the United States.
Speaker 5 (15:25):
When he came here, I first started observing him, knowing
that I was going to have to observe him to
write about him rather than talk to him, because it
was established early on that it was a dead end.
He will only take questions about the game, and very few,
three maybe four in each language, and these are in
like bit questions. I want to know, like you just
(15:47):
threw one hundred and seventeen pitches, are you what do
you feel today? And he would not He just doesn't
entertain those. He's just not built that way.
Speaker 2 (15:55):
Tim says, most of what you know about showhy is
limited to what show Hay is willing to tell you,
and it rarely leaves the realm of the ballpark, and
when it does, it's on show Hay's terms. Like when
he got married, people didn't even know show Hay was
in a relationship until he posted about his wife on Instagram.
Speaker 3 (16:14):
He has lots of titles MVP, Gazillionaire, Superstar, but husband
had eluded him until now. And he made the announcement
where else but on social media that reads, not only
have I begun a new chapter in my career with
the Dodgers, but I also have begun a new life
with someone from my native country of Japan, who is
very special to me. And I wanted everyone to know
(16:36):
I am now married.
Speaker 2 (16:38):
Show He's teammates and even Dodgers manager Dave Roberts didn't
know about it, and I felt like it was a
good time because before the season I didn't want really
any distractions.
Speaker 5 (16:50):
The season started, I think there is this this sort
of the aura, right, like, just leave him alone to
do what he does because the distractions are not something
he's interested in. He's not interested in talking to me,
to be honest. He does it as an obligation after
he pitches. He hits two home runs in a game,
he'll stand there and answer questions in the most anadyne
(17:13):
way possible.
Speaker 4 (17:14):
Are you nervous at all? Playing in the postseason for
the first time?
Speaker 2 (17:21):
But the league, the teams, and the fans don't seem
to mind not knowing much about show his life off
the field because what's happening on the field is record
breaking the strikeout.
Speaker 5 (17:32):
He's really challenged our idea of limits because he has
shown his talent to be limitless. He does the two
things that excite baseball people more than anything else.
Speaker 4 (17:42):
Well Tony Dios take called strike three.
Speaker 5 (17:45):
He can throw a baseball over one hundred miles an hour,
and he can hit a ball five hundred feet over
the road. It's like the two headline acts of baseball.
He is among the best in the world at both,
if not the games.
Speaker 4 (18:01):
There goes Old Toddy. It's a leadoff home run after
he struck out three at the top.
Speaker 2 (18:07):
Of the first.
Speaker 5 (18:08):
He is a dream for Major League Baseball.
Speaker 2 (18:12):
And the Dodgers rewarded him in the fall of twenty
twenty three with a record breaking contract. It is the
announcement that took the Baseball World by storm today.
Speaker 5 (18:20):
Seven hundred million dollars over ten years.
Speaker 4 (18:23):
Oh my goodness, come on.
Speaker 2 (18:29):
One of the league's premier franchises made a historic bet
on show Hay because they knew his success would be
their success. They stood to make a lot of money too,
ticket sales, merchandise partnerships. Show his success could pay off
big time for the Dodgers in MLB, show Hey himself
makes more than one hundred and twenty five million dollars
(18:51):
in endorsements a year, with much of that money coming
from advertisements. In Japan, when I was.
Speaker 5 (18:58):
There, I was shot. You could literally not walk more
than two blocks in Tokyo without seeing his face on something,
whether it was a green tea or a water sports drink,
or Hugo Boss or something. I mean, everywhere is Otani.
Speaker 3 (19:14):
After touching down in Tokyo, It's easy to see otani
Mania is really a thing.
Speaker 2 (19:21):
Everyone in Japan is, by default a Showhy fan.
Speaker 5 (19:27):
The appetite for Otani, the love for Otani appears to
be as limitless as his talent.
Speaker 2 (19:33):
If Showhey reputation takes a hit, it wouldn't just turnish
his name. It would have devastating consequences for the Dodgers,
for major League Baseball, and for Japan.
Speaker 1 (19:46):
Thank you so much for listening. If you enjoyed what
you heard, you can now binge all six episodes of
The Betrayal of Sho hey Otani on the thirty for
thirty podcast feed, or by searching the Betrayal of Show
hey Otani on the iheartra You app, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube,
or wherever you get your podcasts. I hope you enjoy
this podcast as much as I do.
Host
Andrea Gunning
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