--- description: Find out why Shohei Ohtani is one of the 100 most influential people of 2021. title: Shohei Ohtani: The 100 Most Influential People of 2021 image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt6c3f330708f6b00c/698a1cd5db2987cee6266e10/shohei-ohtani-time-100-2021.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 --- Sep 15, 2021 # Shohei Ohtani by Alex Rodriguez  Sean M. Haffey—Getty Images Shohei Ohtani is having an extraordinary season, one like we have never seen before. His skill on the mound, coupled with his dominance at the plate, is unparalleled throughout the major leagues. He’s the modern-day Bambino—and yet even Babe Ruth wasn’t stealing 20-plus bases, hitting 40-plus homers and throwing 100 m.p.h. in the same season. Only Shohei can. If you were to Frankenstein every unique talent into one player, you’d get Shohei Ohtani. He has the power of Bryce Harper, the pitching of Max Scherzer and the speed of Trea Turner. Not only is he incredible on the field, but off the field he’s a gentleman. His teammates have only good things to say about Shohei, and he is great with the media and fans too. You can tell he is a hard worker, from his improvement year to year and his vertical-jump increase to the career-year he’s put together in 2021\. Shohei has been a true joy to watch this year. I am a huge fan, and he is easily worth the price of admission. I can’t wait to see how he finishes the season. [_Rodriguez_](http://content.time.com/time/specials/packages/article/0,28804,1946375%5F1946333%5F1946332,00.html "undefined") _is an ESPN analyst and a former professional baseball player_ ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"Article","@id":"https://time.com/collections/100-most-influential-people-2021/6096102/shohei-ohtani/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/collections/100-most-influential-people-2021/6096102/shohei-ohtani/"},"headline":"Shohei Ohtani","datePublished":"2021-09-15T11:19:10.000Z","dateModified":"2026-07-21T07:22:13.378Z","description":"","url":"https://time.com/collections/100-most-influential-people-2021/6096102/shohei-ohtani/","keywords":["TIME 100","franchise","T100 2021"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt6c3f330708f6b00c/698a1cd5db2987cee6266e10/shohei-ohtani-time-100-2021.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"TIME Staff","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/time-staff/"}],"creator":"TIME Staff","articleSection":"","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt6c3f330708f6b00c/698a1cd5db2987cee6266e10/shohei-ohtani-time-100-2021.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/collections/100-most-influential-people-2021/6096102/shohei-ohtani/","name":"Shohei Ohtani"}}]},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"VideoObject","name":"TIME100 | See Everyone on the 2021 TIME100 List","description":"See every 2021 TIME100 Honoree in One Minute","thumbnailUrl":"https://cdn.jwplayer.com/v2/media/ZgB6AGK2/poster.jpg?width=720","uploadDate":"2021-09-15T10:45:00.000Z","contentUrl":"https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/ZgB6AGK2.m3u8","embedUrl":"https://time.com/collections/100-most-influential-people-2021/6096102/shohei-ohtani/","duration":"PT57S","potentialAction":{"@type":"SeekToAction","target":"https://time.com/collections/100-most-influential-people-2021/6096102/shohei-ohtani/?jw_start={seek_to_second_number}","startOffset-input":"required name=seek_to_second_number"}}] ```