Keeping up with Shohei Ohtani - ESPN

SHOHEI OHTANI IS both text and subtext, the brightest light in the firmament and the candle flicker on the wall. He is right there in front of us, obvious in all his brilliance, yet slightly out of reach, his present as clear as his future is uncertain.

This current edition of «Season of Ohtani» feels like the height of something, like a great artist's signature piece or a writer's seminal work. Every oversaturated box score speaks to something previously unattainable, an unrepeatable (for now) shift of the game's tectonics. It feels as if it could be the end of something, or at least a gateway to something completely different.

Ohtani's pending free agency hovers above the Angels' season, following them everywhere. When manager Phil Nevin is asked whether he believes his team can compete with the Astros and Rangers in the American League West, he is being asked whether the Angels can keep Ohtani. When general manager Perry Minasian is asked how many games per month his team needs to win to remain in contention, or whether there is a magical number of losses that will denote non-contention, he is being asked whether the Angels can keep Ohtani. When Angels players are asked whether they feel momentum flowing or ebbing or remaining the same, they are being asked whether the Angels can keep Ohtani.

The only one who is not asked whether the Angels can keep Ohtani is Ohtani.

I set out to contextualize this moment, whatever it is now and whatever it might become: Ohtani on the brink of free agency, and the Angels desperately trying to play well enough to win him over. The idea was to capture the experience beginning with one Ohtani start on the mound and finishing with the next; in this case, seven otherwise random games in