Quote Originally Posted by Dan Druff View Post
Quote Originally Posted by Kalam View Post

I mean if you want to entertain this for your own amusement that is fine. But if you ask anyone in Orange County connected to the illegal sports betting scene they will tell you the simplest explanation is the correct one; and that is Ohtani is just a soccer sports betting whale, which came to light because of a FBI investigation into his bookie that got leaked to the press, and now everyone is in spin control.
That is very possible.

I will ask you about your source's statement, though:

Have the confirmed that Ohtani himself was betting on these games, or just that someone bearding for him SAID it was for Ohtani. Because you can see how the latter can lead to misunderstandings, if the supposed beard is really just a degen himself.

I still think it is more likely this was done on Ohtani's behalf, but I do think my scenario is a possibility. It does not seem that Ohtani ever had direct contact with the bookie, except perhaps to pay off the debt.
Ippei did EVERYTHING for Ohtani. He was his conceirge. Certainly Ippei got Ohtani’s lunch and placed his bets.

A thought just occurred to me. Ippei was paid $300-500k by Dodgers but they played just one game. Ippei was making $80k with the Angels

$80k and a line of credit for $4.5m?

If all concerned had stuck with the first story… Ippei was a degen and Ohtani did the sweet and honorable thing and paid off his debt… Ohtani looks like a great friend and tremendous human being.

Instead they changed the story to theft. Do you know how hard it is these days to make multiple $500,000 withdrawals from a bank? The number of people you would have to deal with? People go to jail for bank theft.

Ohtani’s crew decided to escalate for a reason. They are electing to take on bigger risk.