June 20, 2023

By Mark Whicker

Canadian Baseball Network

They call it the John Olerud Award.

It goes to the college player who distinguishes himself at the plate and on the mound alike, as Olerud did at Washington State on his way to the Blue Jays.

There are not many candidates. It’s reminiscent of the day when Houston Oilers coach Bum Phillips was asked if Earl Campbell was in a class by himself.

“I don’t know what class he’s in,” Phillips said. “But it don’t take long to call the roll.”

The winner in 2022 was Paul Skenes, at Air Force. He was known as a catcher when he played at El Toro High in Orange County, California, the alma mater of MLB third baseman Nolan Arenado and Matt Chapman.

Skenes is 6-foot-6 and hit .314 with a 1.046 OPS for the Falcons. Then he turned around and went 10-3 as a pitcher with a 2.73 ERA.

Air Force coach Mike Kazlausky knew how rare it was for such a Falcon to touch down on his diamond.

“He’s going to have to transfer,” he said last year, “because he is going to be a first-round pick.”

He was understating. Skenes transferred to LSU and became the best pitcher in college ball, so good that was taken first overall by the Pittsburgh Pirates in this year’s MLB draft.

Aided by pitching coach Wes Johnson, formerly of the Minnesota Twins, Skenes struck out 48% of the batters he faced this season.

He went 12-2 with a 1.81 ERA, racking up 200 strikeouts as opposed to 19 walks. He led off the College World Series with 7 2/3 innings against Tennessee, and struck out 12.

But he was no longer a candidate for the Olerud. Skenes was given 18 at-bats this season and had zero hits. Just imagine if he’d had to face Skenes.

“We thought, wait a minute, he’s going to get an $8 million signing bonus,” Johnson told Baseball America. “We can do this without him hitting. We can’t do it without him pitching. And if a pitcher runs a fastball up and in and breaks one of his fingers, that’s not good for Paul.”

Instead, the Olerud will likely go to Florida’s Jac Caglianone, who led college baseball with 31 home runs yet went 7-3 on the mound with a 3.78 ERA. He, too, was at the College World Series, and Caglianone vows to continue his double-duty as long as he can.

By then, Shohei Ohtani will be able to buy most colleges, series, and Worlds, for that matter.

If you’re tired of people gushing over what Ohtani has done in both halves of the inning the past two years, be prepared for more. And don’t blame the gushers, blame him. He keeps improving.

As a pitcher, Ohtani leads the American League in fewest hits per nine innings (6.0) and is third in strikeouts.

As a hitter, Ohtani is first in home runs, triples and slugging, and is the only American Leaguer over 1.000 in OPS.

This is the first season Ohtani has been paid anywhere close to his production. He is making $30 million for this year only, as he eyes free agency this fall. In the two seasons before that, Ohtani was making $5.5 million and $3 million.

He speaks little of his plans, but he has indicated that the Angels need to start winning to earn his loyalty when the marketplace calls.

The Dodgers cleared a lot of payroll room last year, which isn’t helping them much in the field, but might be providing a runway for Ohtani. The Mariners also bid strongly for Ohtani when he left Japan.

San Francisco took a mighty swing at Aaron Judge last winter and missed, and now has rearranged their organization and appears ready to contend again. The Giants desperately need box-office, all of a sudden, and nobody has more drawing potential on a nightly basis than Ohtani.

Given health, there is little doubt that the 28-year-old Ohtani will take all previous salary records and knock them halfway to Yokohama. Just what is a fair number for the most unfair player of his age?

Well, the Yankees’ Gerrit Cole is making $36 million a year through 2028. He can opt-out after 2024, but the Yankees can deprive him of that option by guaranteeing another $36 million year in 2029, when Cole will be 38. Cole is 9-2 this year with a 2.85 ERA, and his excellent 1.120 WHIP is actually his worst since 2017.

So it would be reasonable to call Ohtani a $36 million a year pitcher in the context of Cole.

Now let’s give him a bat and see how it pencils out. Judge would be the only fair comparison, because Ohtani’s offensive numbers have already surpassed those of teammate Mike Trout, even though Trout plays a defensive position fairly well and Ohtani is a DH when he isn’t pitching.

Judge is a plus outfielder, and his OPS exceeds Ohtani’s, although he doesn’t qualify officially because he’s missed too many games. But Judge is also three years older than Ohtani.

The Yankees recaptured Judge’s services for nine years at $40 million per. So it would be reasonable for Ohtani to ask for the same as a hitter.

Combine Ohtani’s pitching and batting services, and that’s $76 million a year. Give him eight years, and that’s $608 million.

Who can rationally argue? The buyer would be getting the equivalent of two premium players, except these two are 28 years old. The downside, of course, is that an injury to Ohtani would mean the removal of those two premium players, and the chances of injury are 100% higher for Ohtani than for anyone else.

But it’s difficult to see him settling for anything less, particularly if he wins at least two legs of the American League Triple Crown – and he is also hitting .300.

If it were easy or even imaginable for anyone else to do what Ohtani is doing, more would be doing it, or at least trying it

Brendan McKay had those ambitions when he came out of Louisville and was drafted by Tampa Bay, but he’s been felled by a number of injuries and will miss the whole of 2023 with Tommy John surgery.

Spencer Schwellenbach of Nebraska was also an Olerud winner but also got hurt after Atlanta drafted him. Now he’s healthy and winning for Class-A Augusta, but he is only pitching.

Even in college, where a heavy week consists of four games, there is too much preparation, too much maintenance, and too much risk.

The sports world, and indeed the world in general, is besotted by hype. Nikola Jokic, Pat Mahomes and Connor McDavid are truly great players in their time. It is premature, unfair and frivolous to speak of any of them in an all-time context, at least not yet.

The automatic rejection of that type of hype has dimmed our view of just who Ohtani is and what he is doing. Barry Bonds never pitched; Roger Clemens rarely batted. In a sport that is choking itself on specialization, Ohtani’s ambition sets him apart from everyone who has ever played since Babe Ruth and, really, 1919 was the only year in which Ruth both pitched and hit at the level that Ohtani has reached in the past 2 1/2 years.

So it will be an interesting winter. If it materializes as it should, there might be a Shohei Ohtani Award someday, with a lot more applicants in line.