Shohei Ohtani officially founded the 50-50 club in a sport in which no player had ever hit more than 42 home runs and 42 stolen bases in the same season in its century-plus history.
For some players, this would be a career-defining achievement. For Ohtani, it's just another entry on a seemingly mythical resume, and he followed it up by creating the 51-51 club in the same game.
The Los Angeles Dodgers star hit his 49th, 50th and 51st home runs and stole his 50th and 51st bases, all in a single game against the Miami Marlins on Thursday, making history with a 6-for-6 game with three homers, two doubles, two steals, four runs and 10 RBIs in a 20-3 Dodgers victory.
The home run that made it 50-50 came in the seventh inning, earning him a bye on the road.
That history makes Ohtani the favorite to win his third career MVP award, which would also join him with Frank Robinson as the only players to win the award in both leagues.
Ohtani is accomplishing all of this in a season in which he isn't doing what made him the international face of baseball: hitting and pitching at the same time. His pitching arm is still recovering after undergoing major ulnar collateral ligament surgery late last season, but he had made progress and was able to throw by late August.
Shohei Ohtani reached 50-50 with his best game of the season
It seemed inevitable Thursday that Ohtani would reach 50-50, as he entered the game with 48 homers and 49 stolen bases while wielding one of the hottest bats in baseball. Even the most optimistic Dodgers fans probably didn't see it happening against the Marlins.
And then Ohtani easily recorded the best game of an MVP-level season — and of any player in 2024. It was the first 10-RBI game in Dodgers history and the 16th in MLB history. It was the first time a player had reached two homers, two steals and five hits in a game — and then hit another homer. And all that to record the first 50-50 season in history, a feat many believed impossible before this season.
He reached 50 steals first, led off the game with a double and took third two batters later.
An inning later, he followed with an RBI single and then took second with runners on the corners for his 51st stolen base.
Ohtani's only out of the game came in the third inning, when he hit another double and was thrown out trying to turn it into a triple. Had he succeeded, he would have notched his second career cycle and added even more history to an already ridiculous day.
The homers came in later innings, with Ohtani connecting his first to right field to put the Dodgers up 9-3.
And then the story came in the seventh, sooner than anyone expected.
The final homer came off a position pitcher, Vidal Brujan. Chris Taylor had to extend the game with a two-out single, opening the door for Ohtani to be the exclamation point of all exclamation points.
A hero's welcome awaits him at the Dodgers' home game against the Colorado Rockies on Friday.
Shohei Ohtani added another facet to his game and the score is 50-50
Even before this season, a very compelling argument could be made that Ohtani is the most talented player in baseball history, at least from a tools standpoint.
He can clearly hit and hit with power. As a pitcher, his four-seam fastball and sweeper are elite pitches, with a cutter, sinker, curveball and splitter behind them. He even had His moments with his glove and his arm when he played right field in Japan.
It's not a stretch to say he's an eight-tool player. In fact, that might be conservative.
Ohtani’s speed, though, was the most volatile. At 6-foot-4 and 210 pounds, he’s considered a big man even by baseball standards, and he’s faster than any big man should be. He’s spent much of his career in the top quartile of Statcast sprint speed among MLB players, though he’s always seemed like a footnote on an already long page.
Ohtani had tried to use that speed on the bases in the past, with mixed results. His previous high in stolen bases was 26 in 2021, his first year as an MVP, but he also tied for the MLB lead in failed attempts, with 10. His career success rate entering 2024 was 72.3%, a rate that will have many sabermetricians telling him to stop bothering with stealing bases.
Something changed this year. Ohtani reached 50 stolen bases with just four misses, greatly increasing not only his stealing volume but also his efficiency. The increased base sizes and restrictions on pickoff attempts instituted by MLB last year no doubt also helped.
While it would be easy to credit the presence of Dodgers manager Dave Roberts, a speedster in his playing days who is responsible for arguably the most famous stolen base in MLB history, it is reportedly Ohtani’s work with Dodgers first base coach Clayton McCullough that has helped him become a legitimate problem on the bases.
Of Fabian Ardaya from Athletic:
“With (Ohtani), I don’t know if you can be surprised,” McCullough said. “Like everything he does, he just locks in on something, he just concentrates and learns things during the game. We’ve been watching film before and it’s helped me a lot. We’re going through things and I’ll lock in on something, and then he’ll say, ‘Look at this or that. ’”
“I think he's always been a student of these things. I think now that he has less to do in terms of preparation and pitching, he can focus on that more.”
So in addition to being one of MLB’s best hitters and one of its best pitchers when healthy, Ohtani is now one of its best baserunners, a change he made in his age-30 season. You can attribute that to the change of scenery from the Angels to the Dodgers or perhaps to Ohtani’s opportunity to focus on something else without pitching for a year.
But above all, credit must go to Ohtani, whose talent has allowed him once again to do something unprecedented.
The Dodgers' $700 million investment in Shohei Ohtani has paid off so far
In his first year with the Dodgers, Ohtani has 50 homers, 51 steals, stayed healthy for one of the most injury-plagued teams in baseball and Become an advertising giant for one of the richest teams in the sport.
We'd say it was a good start, even if the team had to overcome the Ippei Mizuhara scandal, in which Ohtani faced troubling questions about his former player's gambling addiction before emerging completely unscathed in the eyes of the U.S. Department of Justice, the IRS and MLB.
It seems like a long time ago that Ohtani’s contract, worth $700 million, was reported to have fallen like a stone on the crystal that was fans’ understanding of how athlete contracts worked. His considerable financial deferrals softened the blow for the Dodgers’ business side, but the record-breaking deal positioned him as the only player in baseball not allowed to have a bye year.
And Ohtani didn't. Instead, he's the clear favorite for the NL MVP award and is set to make his MLB playoff debut in his seventh major league season, having accomplished something that seemed nearly impossible before this summer.
