The Wild Saga of Shohei Ohtani’s 50-50 Ball

Eriq Gardner (0:02)

The judge looked at all the evidence and said, I can't decide, even while watching this repeatedly slow down.

It is just ambiguous evidence here. And so it looks like it's going to trial.

Peter Hamby (0:17)

Welcome to The Powers That Be Daily, Pucks podcast focused on the intersection of Wall Street, Washington, Silicon Valley, and Hollywood and the players who run it all. I'm Peter Hamby. It's Friday, October 16th. Today I'm joined by Eriq Gardner, who tells me how a coveted Shohei Ohtani home run ball led to a wild legal fight between three men who scrambled to recover it in the stands.

And speaking of baseball, it's had a great run over the last few years with big ratings, fast-paced games, and young star players. But is Major League Baseball heading for a labor lockout after this season? As Eriq explains, that seems likely. We'll discuss all that and much more on today's episode of The Powers That Be.

Happy Friday, everybody, and welcome to The Powers That Be. I'm joined today by my colleague Eriq Gardner for a little baseball episode. Eriq has done some fascinating and entertaining reporting about a fight for Shohei Ohtani's historic 50-50 ball that was hit into the stands in Miami in 2024 A bunch of fans piled on the ball. One person, I think, grabbed another person by the balls, and it's now the subject of a multi-million dollar lawsuit. We're also going to talk, speaking of baseball, about the possibility that labor talks will collapse after this season. Will there be a strike slash lockout? We're going to get into it. Eriq, we are taping this episode before Thursday night's Dodgers-Brewers Game 4 Things aren't looking great for the Dodgers, but let's talk about Shohei Ohtani. Tell me about this home run ball. One, why it's so valuable. And then two, what is the lawsuit about?

Eriq Gardner (2:11)

Yeah, well, I mean, no player in the history of baseball has hit 50 home runs and 50 stolen bases before.

He did it two years ago. He's obviously one of the all-time greats of the sports. Previous home run balls by Barry Bonds and such went for millions of dollars. This one, there's a fight over who collects the money, but it has been sold at auction and it went for more than $4 million. The question now is, who's entitled to that? And so it's the perfect setup for a lot of legal wrangling.

This started off with a pitch, but now it's a completely insane courtroom activity here.

Peter Hamby (2:55)

Let's talk about the courtroom activity. I mean, just walk us through what happened in the stands when this ball made it out of the park.

Eriq Gardner (3:02)

Yeah, so, you know, it was Bedlam. I mean, the ball landed underneath a table at some bar that was in the outfield section. And the ball stood there for a few seconds. And then, you know, a crush of people went charging for this ball. And it's a little hard to make out exactly what happened. One person says that he had it first and then he was jumped. Another person says he had it, but then his hands got trapped between the legs of someone else and it was wrestled out from him. Regardless, a third person says he got the ball, he walked away with it. And, you know, they're each suing each other, trying to say, you know, I'm entitled to the ball, you know, but for the other person's assault, I would have had the millions. And so it's amazing in this day and age, you know, in sports, we're used to instant replay. You know, we go to the booth, we get the tapes, and this is no different. Except in this instance, there's lots of people with cell phones who are recording, there was security footage from that bar.

There were a ton of witnesses. And the amazing thing is, after two years of litigation, where everyone was interviewed, the briefs include freeze frames of the guys with, you know, some of them had wristbands on, so you could, you know, forensically look at like, oh, at this precise second, the guy with the blue wristband is touching the ball. But after all that, the judge looked at all the evidence and said, I can't decide.

Even while watching this repeatedly slowed down, it is just ambiguous evidence here. And so it looks like it's going to trial.

Peter Hamby (4:52)

Yeah, this is, as you wrote, baseball's answer to the Zapruder film. There's so many different angles here. But there are three guys, I also need to read this sentence in your piece.

One of the men has counter sued, this is there's lawsuits flying back and forth, as you said, has counter sued for battery with an allegation that gives the phrase ball dispute an unfortunate second meaning. He claims that while he was crouched over the baseball, Mattis, one of the other men, intentionally reached into his quote crotch area while he was trying to take the baseball. Zacek says he was the victim of the offensive contact. So the judge just ordered this auctioned off and the proceeds will be split between the three men. Is that where it's at? And who auctioned it off?