Shohei Ohtani has mastered American baseball.
He has conquered October.
He has rewritten record books.
He has stood under confetti wearing “World Series Champions” across his chest.
And yet, there was a time not long ago when he didn’t even know what the Super Bowl was.
The admission came casually, almost playfully, during an interview. But like many things Ohtani says, it carried quiet weight.
“When I was living in Japan and they were doing the Super Bowl, I had no idea what the Super Bowl was.”
No exaggeration. No attempt to dramatize it. Just honesty.
In the United States, the Super Bowl functions less like a game and more like a ritual. It shuts down cities. It merges sports with celebrity, advertising with spectacle. It’s the closest thing America has to a collective pause.
For Ohtani, that world simply didn’t exist.
Baseball was his universe. Training was routine. Goals were internal. The NFL’s grandest stage unfolded oceans away, culturally distant and irrelevant to a young two-way prospect in Hokkaido.
Now, he stands in Los Angeles — arguably the epicenter of American sports entertainment — acknowledging how surreal that transformation feels.
“Coming over here, I see the excitement that surrounds the Super Bowl. It’s really, really cool,” he said. “It’s like a national holiday.”
That phrase matters.
Because Ohtani has not just adjusted to American sports culture — he has become one of its pillars. His games draw global attention. His highlights transcend language. His contract reshaped economic conversations across leagues.
And yet, he still views the Super Bowl as something observed, not inhabited.
He admitted he might watch some of the game. But not fully devote the day to it.
There’s something revealing in that restraint.
While millions build their Sunday around kickoff, Ohtani is already in Arizona, quietly working at Camelback Ranch. Preparing. Adjusting. Recalibrating for a season layered with expectation and the added complexity of the 2026 World Baseball Classic.
His schedule isn’t aligned with spectacle.
It’s aligned with purpose.
Meanwhile, several Dodgers teammates openly predicted the Seahawks’ victory in Super Bowl LX, unanimously dismissing the Patriots. They were right. Perfect predictions. Locker room confidence spilling into football analysis.
Ohtani remained slightly removed.
Not disinterested.
Just different.
That difference underscores the uniqueness of his journey. Many American athletes grow up with the Super Bowl as background noise to childhood. Ohtani grew up in a culture where baseball reigned supreme and American football barely registered.
Now he straddles both worlds.
He represents a globalization of baseball that the NFL is still chasing. The league has expanded internationally, staging games across Europe and South America, yet even the Super Bowl’s cultural dominance hasn’t fully crossed every border.
Ohtani embodies that divide.
A player who became America’s biggest baseball star without absorbing every American tradition along the way.
It doesn’t diminish him.
It humanizes him.
There’s irony in the image: Ohtani, standing amid World Series celebration chaos, learning about the Super Bowl like a curious newcomer.
He has mastered one American spectacle.
He’s still discovering another.
And maybe that’s what makes him uniquely compelling.
Because even at the height of his fame, even with championships and MVPs stacking up, Shohei Ohtani still carries the perspective of someone who arrived, observed, and chose what mattered most.
For him, Sunday isn’t a holiday.
It’s another step toward October.
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