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Sho-Time

The Inside Story of Shohei Ohtani and the Greatest Baseball Season Ever Played

Published by Diversion Books
Distributed by Simon & Schuster
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About The Book

The story behind Major League Baseball’s two-way playing phenomenon and his rise from early days in Japan to his historic 2021 MVP season.

About The Author

Jeff Fletcher has covered Major League Baseball since 1997, including eight seasons on the Los Angeles Angels beat for the Orange County Register, and has covered Shohei Ohtani more than any other writer in the United States. Jeff has also covered the San Francisco Giants and Oakland A's and worked as a national baseball writer. He is a Hall of Fame voter and has served as chairman of the Los Angeles chapter of the Baseball Writers Association of America since 2015. He lives in Los Angeles, California.

Product Details

  • Publisher: Diversion Books (August 29, 2023)
  • Length: 256 pages
  • ISBN13: 9781635769234

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Raves and Reviews

"Shohei Ohtani was the biggest story of the 2021 season, and perhaps any season. In Sho-Time, Jeff Fletcher masterfully chronicles not only what Ohtani accomplished in ‘21, but also provides the full context to his achievements. From Ohtani's origin story in Japan to his recruitment by the Angels, his injury-marred 2019 and ‘20 seasons to his place in history next to Babe Ruth, Fletcher's book is the definitive look at Ohtani's two-way majesty."
Ken Rosenthal, Senior Writer at The Athletic

"Historians will be talking about Shohei Ohtani's 2021 season for decades, and thankfully the baseball gods arranged for Jeff Fletcher to be there to cover baseball's best two-way player ever in the midst of a pandemic, to bear witness and mine details and write with grace about the sport's most incredible individual performance."
Buster Olney, ESPN

"Shohei Ohtani is a singular phenomenon in baseball, and there's nobody better to tell his story than Jeff Fletcher. Sho-Time is the essential portrait of baseball's most captivating player, chronicling Ohtani's rise from child prodigy in the snowy Iwate Prefecture to two-way MVP sensation under the bright lights of Major League Baseball. Fletcher goes beyond the carefully scripted press conferences, revealing in vivid detail the challenges and triumphs of a baseball journey like no other."
Tyler Kepner, The New York Times

"OK, I'll admit it. I'm obsessed with Shohei Ohtani. I missed out on watching that Babe Ruth guy, but I feel lucky to have watched this guy. I even thought I knew a lot about him until I opened my copy of Jeff Fletcher's brilliant new book. Sho-Time taught me so much I didn't know about the most unique baseball player of our lifetimes. From the moment I read that phrase, ‘10-tool player,' I was hooked!"
Jayson Stark, The Athletic

"This is one the best baseball books ever published relevant to Japan-U.S. relations. Jeff Fletcher is the most experienced of the Angels beat writers, and usually the first one to ask Shohei Ohtani questions after the game. I admire the way he has exchanged information with Japanese writers for four years. This book is the fruit of his efforts. I always follow Jeff's work in order to find new information relevant to Ohtani or Major League Baseball."
Hideki Okuda, Sports Nippon

"I thought I knew everything about Shohei Ohtani because I had seen all of his games and interviewed him for the first time in Tempe in 2018, but I didn't quite know the extent of everything he did to redesign himself on the physical and mental side until after I read Sho-Time. I really appreciated learning about Ohtani's dedication to be the best, starting from his days in Japan. I realized how much it took for him to get to this point, to have the best year in baseball history."
Mark Gubicza, Angels television analyst

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