Shohei Ohtani, fresh off leading Japan to win in the World Baseball Classic, said the title strengthened his goal of winning a title with the Angels.
“I thought that,” he said in Japanese. “I thought the intensity of a protracted battle like the WBC or the playoffs was special.”“It doesn’t change what I do,” he said. “Even if I hadn’t played in the WBC, my intensity toward the season would be the same. To be able to experience that kind of atmosphere before the season is special, but it doesn’t fundamentally change the fact that I want to do my best.
“It was equally fun to [October baseball],” he added later. “It also wasn’t that. People who are baseball fans and people who said it wasn’t [equal to the playoffs] got into it. I think that’s No. 1. I was nervous, but I had just as much fun.” Japan’s Shohei Ohtani pitches against the United States in the World Baseball Classic final on Tuesday.
He was asked afterward if it was difficult to adjust from the intensity of playing in the WBC to pitching on the lower fields of the Angels’ Tempe facility.
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