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Music.
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What's up everybody welcome back to baseball connection so hot off the press
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there's a big story right now surrounding shohei otani the face of baseball
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the international superstar,
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shohei otani so he is
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in the news right now because the dodgers
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have fired his interpreter well what why why why is this happening why did the
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dodgers fire his interpreter well because Because Ohtani's attorneys are accusing
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this interpreter of massive theft tied to alleged gambling. Let's rewind.
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Okay. What exactly happened?
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So Ohtani's name has surfaced in a federal investigation of a guy named Matthew Boyer.
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He's an Orange County resident. And he's, he is a bookmaker and they're,
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they're, the feds are investigating this guy because he allegedly running an
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illegal bookmaking operation.
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Bookmaking is, is, you know, facilitating sports or no, sorry,
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facilitating gambling.
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Okay. And that is, that's what's going on. So federal agents raided this guy's
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house last year as part of this investigation.
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They're trying to, you know, they're trying to see if he's, if he's an illegal
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bookmaker. Well, that's what is going on right now.
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But where it gets interesting is that there's a record,
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federal investigators were able to find evidence that there are wire transfers
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from Shohei Ohtani's personal bank account to this illegal bookie.
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Okay so of large
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amounts large sums of money we're talking to a total of four and a half million
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dollars from shohei otani over the course of time you know multiple transactions
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of 500 000 or you know just spread out and for a total of four and a half million
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dollars to this illegal bookmaker.
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So that set off a series of events. And initially what happened was Otani's
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camp, just before the season started, because technically right now, as I speak,
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game two of the Seoul series is occurring between the Padres and the Dodgers.
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That's on Thursday, United States time, in the morning in the United States.
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On Wednesday morning, United States had game one, Dodgers won that.
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But on Tuesday, just before that, that Otani's camp, they had a spokesman who
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told ESPN that Otani had transferred the funds over to this bookie because he
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was covering his interpreter's gambling debt.
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His interpreter's name is Ipe Mizuhara.
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So they said that, Otani's camp said that, and then they presented Mizuhara
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himself to ESPN for a 90-minute interview on Tuesday night.
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And then during that 90-minute interview, Mizuhara laid out his account in great detail.
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And the following day, just as ESPN prepared to publish the story,
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that same spokesman who told ESPN that Otani had wired the money to the bookie
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to cover the interpreter's gambling debt,
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that same spokesman disavowed Mizuhara's 90-minute interview and said Otani's
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lawyers would issue a statement.
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So then Otani's lawyers and came out with a statement and say,
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and they said that Otani had been the victim of massive theft and they're turning
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the matter over to the authorities.
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The statement didn't specify who they believed perpetrated the theft,
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but then later the Dodgers come out and say they're firing the interpreter.
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So, I mean, if we connect the dots, what does that mean?
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What does that mean? If you're firing the interpreter, you know,
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because for whatever reason, I mean, if you connect the dots,
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it means the Dodgers believe that the interpreter did something wrong.
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And if Otani's legal team says that Otani was just a victim of a massive theft,
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well, yeah, they're connecting the dots.
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It means the Dodgers fired this guy because they're saying that this dude stole
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money from Otani. So ESPN did review bank information, which showed Otani's
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name on two $500,000 payments in September and October.
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That's the evidence that they got a hold of.
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But at the top of their article, they're saying that at least $4.5 million in
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wire transfers were sent from Otani's bank account to this bookie.
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So that's from the federal investigation.
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investigation so
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what do we have here we have a situation where the
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only hard evidence we know is that money was transferred from
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otani's account to this bookie and before i
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even go on the juicy part about this is that during that 90 minute interview
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between mizuhara and espn he told espn that otani himself logged onto otani's
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laptop and with mizuhara watching over his shoulder her and then wire the money over.
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And then ESPN asked him, well, why didn't Otani just send the money to Mizuhara
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and have Mizuhara take care of the debt?
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Mizuhara said it's because Otani didn't trust him to not gamble it away again.
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So Otani, he said that Otani himself did the transaction because he didn't trust
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the interpreter not to gamble the money away.
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So yeah, that's such a red red flag it is such a red flag and when espn reviewed
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the wire transfer data for two of the transactions each of them totaling 500
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000 a million dollars worth of transactions right there,
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you see shohayotani's name on the
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bank on the bank account information on the wire transfer
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information and the word loan next to it that's
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that's that's what is on the data and
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that's what what you see there according
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to mizuhara on tuesday he said
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that they added the word loan to the description field because
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they had to put a description in there and they
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had to put something so they put just put the word loan in there okay so let's
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break it down first of all how does a guy and yes mizuhara actually makes a
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lot of money he told espn that he had been paid between 300 to 500 thousand
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dollars per year okay so let's even just take the upper end let's say It's a lot of money.
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Let's say this guy makes half a million dollars a year. Even at that,
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what kind of bookie is extending a credit line of up to $4.5 million for a guy
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who makes $500,000 a year? That makes no sense.
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How is he going to pay that back? I mean, first of all, he's $500,000 a year
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and he lives in California. So.
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With taxes taking more than half of that, like half of that goes to taxes,
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probably even slightly more, and then living expenses, et cetera, et cetera.
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So how is somebody on a $500,000 income able to support a debt of $4.5 million
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and the bookie is willingly extending him that credit line?
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Because they're saying that he met the bookie in, Mizuhara met the bookie in 2021.
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And by the end of 2022, Mizuhara's gambling debt had increased to $1 million.
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Dollars so we're seeing that the
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transactions totaled 4.5 million dollars so from
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the end of 2022 to the end of 2023 basically a
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year a further three and a half million dollars of debt was was extended to
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this guy on credit how how for a guy so three and a half million dollars for
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a guy who makes a salary of at most 500k and potentially even less than that
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how that that's where this this whole thing falls apart to me.
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And what makes it even more fishy is that Ohtani's camp contradicted themselves.
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But before this whole thing even gets started, they contradict themselves.
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They come out and fervently say, in the beginning, the story they go with is
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Ohtani is sending the money to the bookie. They say it themselves.
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The spokesman said it, and then Mizuhara said it.
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They say it twice, that Ohtani sent this money to the bookie to cover Mizuhara's gambling debt.
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That's the story they went with. And then the very next day,
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they change it completely. completely and they say, no, Otani wasn't involved
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in facilitating these transactions at all.
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The money was stolen from him. Okay. So let's, let's, let's go down that path.
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Let's say the money was stolen from Otani. Okay. How, how do you explain the
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wire transfers from Otani's personal bank account to the bookie?
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That means somebody else who wasn't Otani, who had access to Otani's bank account,
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made those transactions under Otani's name. How is that possible?
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How do you Why are $500,000 without any kind of identity verification?
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I mean, that amount of money, and this is not just a one-time thing.
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This is multiple times, a total of four and a half million dollars.
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How do you make all these wire transfers for millions of dollars under someone else's name?
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How do you do that under someone else's name? Do that other person's account.
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Without the bank running any kind of verification, identity verification when
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you're conducting the transaction?
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That's a question. So that's a red flag. So that's something that Otani's legal
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team is going to have to answer for.
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So, I mean, this guy Mizuhara, he's in Korea.
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I mean, the Dodgers are in Korea for the season opening series. series
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i mean he was in the dugout during game
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one and he was he was there on wednesday
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and then all of a sudden you know when the story comes out they say they fire him so so so
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so i mean oh man this this whole
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this whole story i mean
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okay i'll give my take on it i mean super super
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fishy when they smoke this fire i mean i'm just
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gonna give my opinion it sounds to me like otani was
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involved involved in gambling and they're
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using mizuhara as the fall guy because of
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course they have to protect that they can't you know let it be known or you
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know yeah they can't let me know that otani was involved it looks to
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me like you know they're using mizuhara as hey you
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know you're gonna you're gonna take the blame for this and of course you
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know they could they could compensate mizuhara for you know
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for this later down the line or whatever because at
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the end of the day it's it's not really going to do anything for his image
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because he's yeah he's not the face of major
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league baseball so yeah i
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mean this is this is where we stand with things right now so what does this
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mean as far as like you know potential you know punishments or like what does
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this mean so the rules let's let's look at the rules right so major league baseball
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does have a rule about making payments to illegal bookies.
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Rule 21d3 states that any player, umpire, or club,
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or league official, or employee who places bets with illegal bookmakers shall
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be subject to such penalty as the commissioner deems appropriate in light of
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the facts and circumstances of the conduct.
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So they don't specify what the penalty is. They say it's within the commissioner's discretion.
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If you look at precedent, go back to 2015, someone has been penalized under
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this rule, Marlins pitcher Jarrett at COSART,
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he was fined and not suspended by Major League Baseball for violating this rule
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because it was determined by the league that he had not bet on baseball.
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So that's the only, I guess that's the recent precedent we have for this rule.
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But, I mean, it's going to be a tough decision for Rob Manfred because this
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is not Jarrett Cozart, who most people don't even know. This is Shohei Ohtani.
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If it is indeed, you know, if the facts do come out and determine that Ohtani
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himself made bets with illegal bookmakers, yeah, I mean, I guess that's the
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language you have to key in. Key on.
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A player who places bets with illegal bookmakers. is we know that there were
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transactions from Otani's name.
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I guess that's the angle that Otani lawyers are going to have to take and say
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that, hey, there are transactions from Otani's name, but Otani himself did not place bets.
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I mean, the first story was Otani did send the transactions,
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but he was doing it to cover debts.
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That's what they were saying. Now they're saying, no, Otani didn't place the
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transactions himself. The laptop story is not true. Oh, that's not true.
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He was the victim of a massive theft. Now they're going to have to explain how
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exactly that theft occurred, who conducted the theft, how he got away with it.
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And yeah, you know, it's hard to keep a lie afloat. Let me just say that.
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That's one thing I know about the universe.
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It is hard to keep a lie afloat. You have to spend more energy to keep a lie
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going because if it's not true, you know, you're going to have to just be,
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you have to remember everything you said.
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You have have to, I mean, they've already contradicted themselves and the whole thing's a mess.
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So that is, that's the story, ladies and gentlemen.
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The Seoul series is going as we speak right now. You know, Dodgers won the first game 5-2.
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In game two right now, it's top of the sixth and the Padres are winning 10-8, close game.
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We'll see how that goes. But Yoshinobu Yamamoto was chased after one inning
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in his Dodgers debut, greeted very harshly.
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I mean, one inning, five runs four hits one walk one hit by pitch i mean this
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dude needed 43 pitches to get through the frame welcome to the major leagues
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mr yamamoto you know he'll settle down but tough debut for him,
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so we're gonna stop it at that i mean we'll definitely have a lot more
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baseball to talk about it's season just starting but this just was a surprise
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that came out on wednesday so obviously i have to jump on here and discuss this
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at length this is the this is the biggest story in baseball right now so that's
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gonna do it for today folks if you enjoyed this please share Tarot Tone would
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be interested and we'll see you next time on Baseball Connection.
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Music.