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The story
A photo posted by the Dodgers’ official X (formerly Twitter) account related to the National League Championship Series (NLCS) was missing Shohei Ohtani, sparking discussion on 5ch’s “Nandemo Jikkyo G” board. Opinions clashed between those saying “of course he’s left out this time” given his batting slump in the Division Series, and those questioning the team’s handling with comments like “they paid him 100 billion yen and this is how they treat him?” Views on how fans on the ground are reacting were also split — some took it as proof his status is now firmly established, while others saw it as evidence he’s facing harsher scrutiny.
What people said
and he's basically a half-time bench player now, so why bother including him?
The only ones lying and acting like Ohtani is the team's main star are Japan's old-guard fake-news media.
Don't lump him in with the rest of the scrubs.
Hope he proves everyone wrong next season.
And here Ohtani fans were saying malatang fans were just chasing a fad that'd fade fast.
He's the face of the franchise, isn't he?
Even in Japan's pro league (NPB), foreign imports who can't hit get treated like garbage too.
Japanese Ohtani stans should look at reality instead of the internet.
Got tired of 'yakyuu' (a mocking slang term for baseball)?
The guy who used to eat plain salt pasta discovered hot dogs and got fat.
His peak has passed.
He can't use his tablet anymore (referring to the tablet he used to study opposing pitchers).
If they'd included him for this, there'd be plenty of other players who'd deserve a spot too.
That's scary.
a 1.79 ERA, an 8-2 record — and that's garbage now?
Same way no one's dumb enough to judge a season purely by cumulative stats —
whatever cushion you built up in the first half means nothing for how you're judged in the second half.
That's all meaningless stuff.
What's his clutch batting average, huh?
What do you mean?
He struggled in the Division Series, so depending on how things go, it's not impossible he gets dropped from the starting lineup.
Nah, his contract requires them to play him if he says he wants to play, so that won't happen.
Exactly.
If they had included him, it would've felt super ironic.
That's already priced in, surely.
Background and Key Points of This Debate
Shohei Ohtani’s contract has a unique structure where the bulk of his 10-year, $700 million deal is deferred and paid out after retirement — the “death row inmate” phrase used in the thread is baseball-fan slang that specifically refers to this kind of contract. The debate centered on whether this “omission” reflected an overall season evaluation or was simply a lineup/usage decision limited to the current National League Championship Series (NLCS). Some posts cited his cumulative stats (30 home runs, a 1.79 ERA, an 8-2 record) to argue he’s “performing plenty well,” while others pointed to his Division Series slump to argue that “recent results matter most” — a classic case of talking past each other over whether to judge by season-long totals or recent performance, a mismatch common in sports debates. It’s worth noting that there’s no primary source within the thread indicating the team’s actual intent, so this remains speculation.
※This article is compiled as an excerpt and summary from the 5ch (Nandemo Jikkyo G) thread “[Sad News] Dodgers’ Official X Account Accidentally Forgets to Include Ohtani wwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww.”
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