The Los Angeles Dodgers landed Shohei Ohtani ahead of the 2024 season as the generational talent inked a 10-year, $700 million deal. As festive as Dec. 2023 was for Dodgers fans, a dark scandal soon followed Ohtani’s now-former interpreter, Ippei Mizuhara.
Mizuhara stole nearly $17 million from Ohtani to fund his secret and illegal sports gambling ventures. He falsified his tax returns and even committed bank fraud by pretending to be the superstar baseball player he worked for, leading to a 57-month prison sentence.
The man who accepted those bets from Mizuhara via one of the largest bookmaking schemes in the country was Mathew Bowyer.