MLB insider reveals chaos caused by incorrect Shohei Ohtani to Blue Jays reports: "Nearly 3,500 people were monitoring the plane"
Shohei Ohtani was reportedly on a plane headed for Toronto. Many reporters said so and it looked like he was preparing to sign there and make his new home. There was even a tracker keeping track of the plane that Ohtani was on.
It was private plane that left California in the morning and arrived in Toronto that afternoon. Reporting suggested that the superstar two-way player was on the flight, but he wasn't. He was at home, sleeping.
That didn’t stop the unending reporting, as everyone was tracking this plane in real time. At the peak, there were about 3,500 people monitoring the plane's flight, even though it was inaccurate reporting that led to it.
MLB insider Bob Nightengale ripped the baseball writing community, harshly laying into them over the Ohtani plane debacle:
"We baseball writers have disgraced ourselves, becoming an embarrassment to the journalism community. We have made fools of ourselves plenty of times before in the history of baseball media, anywhere from criticizing the integration of the sport, to calling Ohtani a fraud in his first spring training, but we have taken this to new heights."
Ohtani's relationship with the media has had its up and downs, but this is a new low for Nightengale. He believes this is shameful and, as he said earlier, disgraceful.
Ohtani wasn't at all headed to Toronto to sign with the Toronto Blue Jays. In fact, the reports that said a decision was "imminent" was inaccurate as well as the slugger's team had no plans to announce anything of the sort.
The next day, Ohtani signed with the Los Angeles Dodgers for 10 years and $700 million. It's unclear but unlikely that the Bue Jays were in serious play and that he was considering a move there.
Shohei Ohtani left reporters in shambles
Reporting surrounding the Shohei Ohtani sweepstakes was all over the place. He initially said that any team that told reporters they'd met with him would be penalized. Ultimately, that didn't happen, but the reporting was working with little information.
It led to some inaccuracies and a brief moment where everyone thought the slugger was absolutely going to sign with the Blue Jays.