There has been no shortage of comparisons between Shohei Ohtani and Babe Ruth since the two-way star broke into the majors in 2018, and for former MLB closer Jonathan Papelbon, it’s clear-cut who he would rather watch.
“It’s revolutionary,” Papelbon told WEEI’s Rob Bradford on the “Baseball Isn’t Boring” podcast. “It’s freakin’ fantastic. People need to realize how lucky you are. In my opinion, if you ask me right now if I’d rather watch Babe Ruth play or Shohei Ohtani, I’m taking Ohtani.
“He’s the modern-day version of Babe Ruth and we should all feel blessed to be watching.”
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One could make the argument that Ohtani is perhaps even more impressive than Ruth.
Ruth did not hit his peak offensive performance until after he stopped pitching whereas Ohtani is doing both at the same time in an era that presents greater challenges as well.
The Los Angeles Angels star leads the majors with 23 home runs and 56 RBRI and a 173 OPS+ while hitting a slashline of .300/.385/.626 and a 1.012 OPS.
On the mound, Ohtani is 6-2 with a 3.29 ERA, 105 strikeouts (second in the AL), 1.05 WHIP and an MLB-leading .178 batting average against.
He is currently the betting favorite to win the AL MVP at -250 odds, per FanDuel.
“I’m starting to think is this guy even real?” Papelbon added. “I know what it takes to play, I know what it takes to prepare. To have to do it on both ends totally amazes me. It’s just, we really should consider ourselves lucky to see this guy play. What else can you say about this guy when he’s freakin’ raking and hitting bombs and pumping 100 [mph]?…Only way he loses [MVP] is if he gets hurt.”
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